Apple’s iPhone 16 family of phones will hit shelves on Friday. Ahead of their launch, I’ve spent the past five days been testing the high-end iPhone 16 Pro Max.
It’s a great phone with cool updates like a dedicated camera button, and it charges faster over MagSafe than earlier Pro models. The screens are also slightly larger than prior versions.
But this review is tricky, because one of the banner features Apple has been hyping — on stage and in its new ads — is Apple Intelligence. It’s Apple’s suite of AI features for the iPhone, and it’s not coming until later this year.
There are reasons to be excited. A few of the new AI features, like changes to Siri, photo editing, and the option to have AI rewrite text for you, will launch in beta in October. More additions, such as as Apple’s image and emoji generator, more personal Siri responses and integration with ChatGPT, will come later.
I was able to test some of the beta features for this review. Others weren’t available. Those limitations make it difficult to provide a comprehensive assessment of the new device or to suggest whether the upgrade is worthwhile.
Apple shares slid earlier in the week after analysts suggested lighter demand for the iPhone 16 Pro models this year. TF Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said the problem is that Apple Intelligence isn’t out at launch. Barclays also feared it may be because the Chinese language version of Apple Intelligence won’t launch until 2025.
Here’s what you need to know about the new iPhone 16 Pro Max, as of now.
The changes to know about
iPhone 16 Pro.
Apple Inc.
The biggest change you’ll notice is the new camera button. I’m still getting used to it after a few days, but I’m already defaulting to just pulling the phone out of my pocket, tapping the button and taking a picture.
My wife rightly asked me why I don’t just hit the camera button on the lock screen like on earlier iPhones. I don’t have a good answer for that. It just feels more natural to push a camera button.
I enjoyed doing a half-press to get camera controls like the zoom during my son’s first soccer game, though I found it was easier to sometimes just pinch to zoom. The new 48-megapixel wide-angle lens offers sharper images in zoomed-out shots that can capture more scenery.
Videographers will likely enjoy the 4K 120fps recording offered on the iPhone 16 Pro Max. Still, I try to keep my clips in lower quality because I’m sharing them over text messages with family and friends.
The iPhone 16 Pro Max has the best battery life of any iPhone yet. Apple’s new A18 Pro processor paired with a larger battery offers up to 33 hours of video playback, up from 29 hours on last year’s iPhone 15 Pro Max. I was usually able to make it to about dinnertime before needing to charge the 15, and I can make it to bedtime — or beyond — with the new phone depending on how much I’m using it.
I love that Apple increased the speed of its MagSafe charging. I used MagSafe when it came out but ultimately switched back to regular cable charging because it was quicker. Now, MagSafe gives up to a 50% charge in 30 minutes if you’re using a 30-watt charger (not included.)
The screens are slightly larger on this year’s Pro models. The iPhone 16 Pro Max moved from 6.7 inches to 6.9 inches. I didn’t notice a difference and could only tell when I put the two phones next to each other. It’s still a fantastic screen with a high refresh rate, which means scrolling is smooth. It’s colorful and bright and I love the always-on display for seeing notifications without picking up my phone. It’s not new this year but still useful and limited to the Pro models.
Apple Intelligence
Apple Intelligence photos
Apple Inc.
In the absence of Apple Intelligence at launch, I’m limited to testing a few beta features. They’re hit or miss, as to be expected in beta.
Apple Intelligence could help drive a new cycle of iPhone upgrades. Apple reported $39.3 billion in iPhone sales during the fiscal third quarter, about 46% of the company’s total revenue and down 1% from a year earlier. CEO Tim Cook said the segment grew on a constant currency basis.
I like email summaries provided by Apple Intelligence. They’re accurate and give you just a couple of lines that summarize what’s said or relayed in an email. This only works in Apple’s Mail app, though, so it won’t work if your company makes you use Outlook or if you prefer Gmail. Similarly, I found that Apple Intelligence accurately summarized long bits of text (including the introduction to this review) and returned an accurate snippet.
In notifications, it’s just OK. Summaries of news alerts were correct. Summaries of text messages sometimes were unnecessary. In one text from my wife, for example, Apple Intelligence suggested I threw a dinosaur at my daughter and made her cry before I apologized. In reality, my son was the culprit. The original text would have been sufficient.
In a daycare app notification that I use, Apple Intelligence did a good job summarizing that my daughter “took a nap, ate Cheerios, and is playing happily.” That would be a perfect amount of information to receive while driving.
Apple Intelligence photos
Apple Inc.
Another Apple Intelligence feature can help you create movie memories, which are little snippets of photos and videos set to music. In a TV ad, Apple shows a young woman using it to create memories of a dead goldfish with the help of Siri.
I couldn’t use Siri to create movies like that. Instead, I opened the Photos app, tapped Memories and wrote in a prompt asking for a photo memory of my son “learning to fish at Skytop set to a fishing tune.” It correctly showed pictures of a family trip to the Poconos but didn’t include any pictures of my son fishing there. The music was called “Fishing Tune” by Jiang Jiaqiang but didn’t sound like fishing music to me. Another test, asking for a photo memory of my son “playing soccer,” worked better but also included a picture of him as a baby with a football in his hands.
There’s also the whole new Siri interface that glows along the edges of the screen. I like the look compared to the globe, and it’s easier to type to Siri by tapping the screen indicator at the bottom of the display. Siri doesn’t feel drastically changed to me right now, although I liked that I could ask iPhone-specific questions like “How do I use my iPhone to scan a document?” and “How do I take a screen recording?” Siri presents the answer in a simple step-by-step guide at the top of the screen.
You can speak to Siri with interruptions now, too. So, if you get stumped while you’re thinking and say “umm” or “hold on a second,” you can continue to ask questions in the same line of thought, like “How tall is the Eiffel Tower?” and then follow with, “And when was it built?” But it doesn’t always work. I tried “How far is Boston?” for example, followed by, “And what’s the weather there?” Siri gave me the weather for my current location.
Apple Intelligence can be useful and I’m excited to see where it goes.
Apple iPhone 16
An attendee holds two iPhone 16s as Apple holds an event at the Steve Jobs Theater on its campus in Cupertino, California, on Sept. 9, 2024.
Manuel Orbegozo | Reuters
I focused this review on the iPhone 16 Pro Max. The iPhone 16 is slightly smaller and has a little less battery life but is otherwise identical. My colleague used the regular iPhone 16.
There are a few differences between the two. The iPhone 16 comes in more colors and is built out of aluminum instead of titanium like the higher-end Pro models. It also has the new camera button but lacks the higher refresh rate and the always-on features of the Pro model displays.
The iPhone 16 will support all of the Apple Intelligence features I’ve mentioned above, plus the ones that are still coming. Apple also upgraded the processor for faster performance and added a new macro camera mode for up-close pictures of objects, as well as support for capturing spatial images for the Apple Vision Pro headset. It offers up to 22 hours of video playback versus the 20 hours in last year’s iPhone 15.
Should you buy it?
The iPhone 16 Pro Max is a solid upgrade, but you’ll probably find the biggest changes if you’re coming from an iPhone 14 Pro Max or earlier. The biggest improvements over last year’s phone are the added camera button, a faster chip, new cameras and a slightly larger display.
When it comes to Apple Intelligence, we’ll all have to wait for features like using Siri to ask about prior calendar events, questions that require personal context, using Siri to control your apps, or Apple’s integration with ChatGPT. So if you’re buying now, it’s for everything but the AI.
An iPhone 16 signage is seen on the window at the Fifth Avenue Apple Store on new products launch day on September 20, 2024 in New York City.
Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images News | Getty Images
The Indonesian government expects Apple to increase its proposed $100 million investment into the country, according to state media, as the iPhone maker seeks clearance from Jakarta to sell its latest phones.
The American tech giant’s latest smartphone model doesn’t meet Indonesia’s 40% domestic content requirements for smartphones and tablets and hasn’t been granted clearance to be sold in the country.
The purpose of the ban is to protect local industry and jobs, with officials asking Apple to increase its investments and commitments to the economy in order to gain greater access.
According to a report from Indonesian state media, the country’s Ministry of Industry met with representatives from Apple on Thursday regarding its proposal to invest $100 million over two years.
The funds would go toward a research and development center program and professional development academy in the country, as per the report.
The company also plans to produce accessory product components, specifically mesh for Apple’s AirPods Max, starting in July 2025, it added.
Apple didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from CNBC.
While the new offer is 10 times larger than a proposal that was reported earlier, the government is still striving to sweeten the deal to get a “fair” commitment.
“From the government’s perspective, of course, we want this investment to be larger,” industry ministry spokesperson Febri Hendri Antoni Arif told state media on Thursday.
He said that a larger investment would help the development of Indonesia’s manufacturing sector, adding that its domestic industry was capable of supporting production of Apple devices such as chargers and accessories.
While Indonesia represents a small market for Apple, it also offers growth opportunities as it has the world’s fourth-largest population, according to Le Xuan Chiew, a Canalys analyst focusing on Apple strategy research.
“Its young, tech-savvy population with growing digital literacy aligns with Apple’s strategy to expand [global sales],” he said, noting that it also offers potential for manufacturing and assembly that supports Apple’s efforts to diversify its supply chain.
Success in this market requires a long-term approach, and Apple’s investment offer demonstrates a commitment to complying with local regulations and paving the way for future growth, he added.
Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi speaks at the opening night of the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles on Aug. 15, 2024.
Rodin Eckenroth | Filmmagic | Getty Images
Intuit shares fell 6% in extended trading Thursday after the finance software maker issued a revenue forecast for the current quarter that trailed analysts’ estimates due to some sales being delayed.
Here’s how the company performed in comparison with LSEG consensus:
Earnings per share: $2.50 adjusted vs. $2.35 expected
Revenue: $3.28 billion vs. $3.14 billion
Revenue increased 10% year over year in the quarter, which ended Oct. 31, according to a statement. Net income fell to $197 million, or 70 cents per share, from $241 million, or 85 cents per share, a year ago.
While results for the fiscal first quarter topped estimates, second-quarter guidance was light. Intuit said it anticipates a single-digit decline in revenue from the consumer segment because of promotional changes for the TurboTax desktop software in retail environments. While that will affect revenue timing, it won’t have any impact on the full 2025 fiscal year.
Intuit called for second-quarter earnings of $2.55 to $2.61 per share, with $3.81 billion to $3.85 billion in revenue. The consensus from LSEG was $3.20 per share and $3.87 billion in revenue.
For the full year, Intuit expects $19.16 to $19.36 in adjusted earnings per share on $18.16 billion to $18.35 billion in revenue. That implies revenue growth of between 12% and 13%. Analysts polled by LSEG were looking for $19.33 in adjusted earnings per share and $18.26 billion in revenue.
Revenue from Intuit’s global business solutions group came in at $2.5 billion in the first quarter. The figure was up 9% and in line with estimates, according to StreetAccount. Formerly known as the small business and self-employed segment, the group includes Mailchimp, QuickBooks, small business financing and merchant payment processing.
“We are seeing good progress serving mid-market customers in MailChimp, but are seeing higher churn from smaller customers,” Sandeep Aujla, Intuit’s finance chief, said on a conference call with analysts. “We are addressing this by making product enhancements and driving feature discoverability and adoption to improve first-time use and customer retention.”
Better outcomes are a few quarters away, Aujla said.
CreditKarma revenue came in at $524 million, above StreetAccount’s $430 million consensus.
At Thursday’s close, Intuit shares were up about 9% so far in 2024, while the S&P 500 has gained almost 25% in the same period.
On Tuesday Intuit shares slipped 5% after The Washington Post said President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed “Department of Government Efficiency” had discussed developing a mobile app for federal income tax filing. But a mobile app for submitting returns from Intuit is “already available to all Americans,” CEO Sasan Goodarzi told CNBC’s Jon Fortt.
Goodarzi said on CNBC that he’s personally communicating with leaders of the incoming presidential administration.
On the earnings call, Goodarzi sounded optimistic about the economy.
“Our belief, which is not baked into our guidance, is that we will see an improved environment as we look ahead in 2025, particularly just with some of the things that I mentioned earlier around just interest rates, jobs, the regulatory environment,” he said. “These things have a real burden on businesses. And we believe that a better future is to come.”
Bluesky has surged in popularity since the presidential election earlier this month, suddenly becoming a competitor to Elon Musk’s X and Meta’s Threads. But CEO Jay Graber has some cautionary words for potential acquirers: Bluesky is “billionaire proof.”
In an interview on Thursday with CNBC’s “Money Movers,” Graber said Bluesky’s open design is intended to give users the option of leaving the service with all of their followers, which could thwart potential acquisition efforts.
“The billionaire proof is in the way everything is designed, and so if someone bought or if the Bluesky company went down, everything is open source,” Graber said. “What happened to Twitter couldn’t happen to us in the same ways, because you would always have the option to immediately move without having to start over.”
Graber was referring to the way millions of users left Twitter, now X, after Musk purchased the company in 2022. Bluesky now has over 21 million users, still dwarfed by X and Threads, which Facebook’s parent debuted in July 2023.
X and Meta didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Threads has roughly 275 million monthly users, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in October. Although Musk said in May that X has 600 million monthly users, market intelligence firm Sensor Tower estimates 318 million monthly users as of October.
Bluesky was created in 2019 as an internal Twitter project during Jack Dorsey’s second stint as CEO, and became an independent public benefit corporation in 2022. In May of this year, Dorsey said he is no longer a member of Bluesky’s board.
“In 2019, Jack had a vision for something better for social media, and so that’s why he chose me to build this, and we’re really thankful for him for setting this up, and we’ve continued to carry this out,” said Graber, who previously founded Happening, a social network focused on events. “We’re building an open-source social network that anyone can take into their own hands and build on, and it’s something that is radically different from anything that’s been done in social media before. Nobody’s been this open, this transparent and put this much control in the users hands.”
Part of Bluesky’s business plan involves offering subscriptions that would let users access special features, Graber noted. She also said that Bluesky will add more services for third-party coders as part of the startup’s “developer ecosystem.”
Graber said Bluesky has ruled out the possibility of letting advertisers send algorithmically recommended ads to users.
“There’s a lot on the road map, and I’ll tell you what we’re not going to do for monetization,” Graber said. “We’re not going to build an algorithm that just shoves ads at you, locking users in. That’s not our model.”
Bluesky has previously experienced major growth spurts. In September, it added 2 million users following X’s suspension in Brazil over content moderation policy violations in the country and related legal matters.
In October, Bluesky announced that it raised $15 million in a funding round led by Blockchain Capital. The company has raised a total of $36 million, according to Pitchbook.