The iPhone 17 Pro Max - the State of the Art

I have a conversation that repeats every year and it goes like this:

My friend “When are you getting the new iPhone xx?”
Me: “Not this year. For sure I’m skipping it.”
My Friend: “Uh huh”

The thing is, there’s no lack of conviction when I say that. Recent years, however, I have been upgrading steadily through the different iPhone iterations. Apple for it’s part, is happy to sell me a new phone each year.

After using this phone for a couple of weeks now, some of the things that are noticeable in the circa 2025 Pro Max:

1. The screen is brighter. Significantly. It’s supposed to have gone from 2000 nits to 3000 nits, but this difference makes for better daylight viewing.

2. The front-facing camera improvements are significant. Center stage, a 48 megapixel camera, and the ability to run the font and back cameras at once in videos (a feature that doesn’t yet seem to have an apparent use). I took a look at the different camera modes and compared a zoomed in square area. Check out the details in the 48 megapixel shot.

3. Battery life does feel improved. So much so that I’ve felt comfortable turning back on the always-on screen features. Sometimes while using the phone to listen to a baby crying, I leave it in places it doesn’t charge overnight and catch up the next day.

4. The glass is supposed to be improved (Ceramic Shield 2). Since the iPhone 16, I stopped using a screen cover and continue to do so this year.

5. Due to ScratchGate, I switched up my case to cover the camera plateau. The Otterbox case is amazing, but this time around I went with the Ghost Case from Dbrand and have been happy with it.

6. The move this year to eSIM pushed me to ditch the physical card. Turns out the process was seamless with Bell.

7. 256gb is really all the space you’ll ever need. That said, ProRes and 48 megapixel RAW shots eat up that space. Prepare to offload media regularly.

These do feel like big upgrades in a cycle where Apple has a well defined process of mini updates every single year. Your mileage will vary, and if coming from a 16 Pro Max, this is really not going to justify the added expense.

The rest of the phone is, well, just as good at the 16 Pro Max was. There are some other smaller changes only geeks would love, take a look here. Many of these features sit a little underused still (camera control, AI), and the rest are things that most casual users won’t even register.

The screen is still too big to reach one-handled my thumb diagonally. And I have big hands. As Marques Brownlee pointed out, he rests the camera plateau on his index finger, and with this full frame plateau, it helps. I can’t quite get used to trusting that move, and let’s face it, moving my hand up the phone means my thumb can’t get to the bottom now.

Over the years, this big phone challenge has me yearning for something a little smaller, like the iPhone Air. But…

“Not this year. For sure I’m skipping it.”