Apple’s New iPhones Are Having Connectivity Problems

Apple’s new range of iPhones includes many changes, but among them, we have the inclusion of the N1 chip—while cellular is still outsourced, Apple is doing its own chip for all other connectivity, including Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Sadly, it looks like early adopters are having trouble with it.

A growing number of early adopters are reporting frustrating and intermittent Wi-Fi connectivity problems. The issues appear to affect all four new models: the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and the iPhone Air. Upon unlocking their new iPhone, the Wi-Fi connection momentarily drops before quickly reconnecting. While a brief interruption may not seem like a big issue for most of you, it can have some significant real-world consequences, most notably for drivers using Apple’s CarPlay system. Since CarPlay relies on a stable Wi-Fi connection to the vehicle, this bug causes the system to disconnect, disrupting navigation, music playback, and hands-free communication, which is probably very unsafe to try and fix while you’re on the road.

Some anecdotal evidence suggests a possible link to the Apple Watch, with several users noting that the disconnections primarily occur when their watch is paired and unlocked, though this has not been confirmed as a consistent contributing factor. In any case, it wouldn’t be out of the ordinary to at least pin this on Apple’s N1 chip. Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread connectivity are all handled by the N1 chip instead of the Broadcom modems we had in the previous generation. It’s less of an extreme move compared to the iPhone 16e, which went with a full-on Apple-made modem to handle everything, including cellular. This doesn’t go all-in as far as connectivity goes just yet, so only those connections are handled by N1. Still, Apple is having some first-gen issues with it, and it’s showing.

It should also be pointed out that Apple’s new launches almost always have at least a quirk or two. That’s the thing with new product launches—you gotta give it a few days before it’s actually good. Hopefully, these aren’t hardware flaws, and it’s something that you can easily fix with a software update.

Keep an eye out for a software update that can hopefully fix this.

SoC

A19 Pro chip

Display

6.3-inches

Storage

256GB, 512GB, or 1TB

Ports

USB-C

Operating System

iOS

Colors

Silver, Cosmic Orange, Deep Blue

The Apple iPhone 17 Pro is the company’s most powerful smartphone to date, offering impressive cameras and the A19 Pro chip. It lets you do practically anything, including shooting quality videos.

Source: MacRumors