iPhone Air review: The thinnest iPhone ever, but at what cost? – 9to5Mac

Every so often, Apple makes a design decision that draws a line in the sand. One that feels like a delineation between one era and the next. The iPhone Air is that kind of device. It’s strikingly thin and sets a new standard for how an iPhone should feel in your hand.

The iPhone Air is also an example of the compromises that come with pushing the design boundaries of a form factor. The question is whether it correctly strikes that balance. I’ve been using the iPhone Air since it was announced last week to find out.

Design

The iPhone Air is the biggest change to the iPhone form factor since at least the iPhone 11 to iPhone 12 transition. My word choice there, however, is deliberate. The iPhone 11 to iPhone 12 represented a change in iPhone design, but not a total redesign that made you marvel at the technical achievement. The iPhone 12’s design was more industrialized than the iPhone 11, opting for a boxier form factor rather than curved edges.

The iPhone Air, on the other hand, is a ground-up redesign akin to the iPhone X. When I picked it up for the first time, it felt unlike any iPhone I’d ever held. I’ve been telling people all week that it feels even better than it looks in Apple’s design video. My first impression holding the iPhone Air really did remind me of how different the iPhone X felt. It’s such an incredible departure from the iPhone design language we’ve grown accustomed to in recent years.

iPhone Air vs iPhone 6 Plus

What makes the iPhone Air feel so nice in the hand? First and foremost, it’s thin. Like really thin. It bests the iPhone 6 by a wide margin to become Apple’s thinnest iPhone ever: the iPhone 6 measured 6.9 mm thick and the iPhone Air measures 5.6 mm thick. The iPhone Air is also significantly lighter than Apple’s Pro phones (but only marginally lighter than the standard phones and the iPhone 16e with smaller screens).

Here are some other comparisons:

The real beauty of the iPhone Air is that thin design, but one detail that surprised me is that the titanium edges of the device are polished rather than matte. Apple describes this as “an elegant high-gloss mirror finish.” This gives the device an even more “premium” feeling than I expected based on the rumors.

Another factor is the size of the display. After using an iPhone 16 Pro for a year with a 6.3-inch display and 8.25 mm chassis, holding an iPhone Air with a 6.5-inch display and 5.6 mm chassis feels like holding the future.

There’s a specific reason the design of the iPhone Air really speaks to me. For years, I used whatever iPhone had the biggest screen. Last year, however, I switched to the smaller iPhone 16 Pro. The primary reason for this was wrist pain. I downsized phones and switched to a different desktop mouse. The wrist pain wasn’t caused by the size of the iPhone 15 Pro Max’s screen, but rather the weight and awkwardness of the chassis.

The iPhone Air sits in what I think is the perfect spot for me. It’s thin and light, yet still has a 6.5-inch display.

One of those remarkable things about the iPhone Air (hear me out): the USB-C port. Apple says that it didn’t have a USB-C port that was thin enough to fit the chassis of the iPhone Air. To solve that problem, it’s using a 3D-printed USB-C port made from titanium that’s thinner and stronger than USB-C ports it’s used in the past. It’s an example of the extent to which Apple had to go to achieve this design.

The plateau

The elephant in the room is the plateau on the back of the iPhone Air. Unlike prior iPhone models, the plateau is home to more than just the camera. It houses the cameras, speaker, and Apple silicon. Apple has essentially shifted the majority of the compute and components of the iPhone Air into that plateau, using the rest of the body for the battery.

I’m glad to have a proper explanation of why Apple opted for the plateau design on the iPhone Air instead of, say, a singular camera cutout like the iPhone 16e. It’s a clear compromise of the iPhone Air’s design. Obviously, Apple would rather the plateau not be there. In practice, though, the plateau is something I noticed during my first few days with the iPhone Air, but it eventually started to blend in.

And yes, the iPhone Air still wobbles when you lay it on a table because the camera protrudes from the plateau.

As lame as it sounds, you have to hold the iPhone Air to truly understand it. I can wax poetic about the design and give you the thickness of every product made in Apple’s history, but nothing compares to holding it in your hands.

The iPhone Air is available in four colors: Sky Blue, Light Gold, Cloud White, and Space Black. I’ve been testing the Light Gold model, and I’ll at least give Apple credit for naming it “Light Gold” instead of just “Gold.” At almost every angle in every lighting environment, it looks much closer to silver than it does gold.

Durability

The iPhone Air is thinner than the iPhone 6, but it’s significantly more durable. Apple says it’s using a grade 5 titanium frame to protect the device.

Apple doesn’t have its head in the sand, either. It’s fully aware of the iPhone 6’s durability problems — particularly in regards to bending. While at Apple Park last week, Apple showed me an example of the durability testing it performed with the iPhone Air. First, I did a test to measure how many pounds of force I could put on a demo device. For me, that’s 60 pounds, apparently, but I’d really like another shot at that now that I’ve had some time to think about the best strategy.

Apple then placed an iPhone Air in a bending simulator contraption and applied 130 pounds of force. This resulted in no damage to the phone at all. And, of course, Apple marketing boss Greg Joswiak put it all on the line last week when he dared tech reporters Lance Ulanoff and Mark Spoonauer to try and bend the iPhone Air during an interview. They were unsuccessful.

iPhone Air exceeds Apple’s stringent bend strength requirements and is undamaged after undergoing an extreme level of force.

Once the iPhone Air is out in the wild, I’m sure a barrage of bend tests will hit YouTube. I’m sure some YouTubers will successfully bend it. In real-world use for normal people, however, I don’t foresee durability being a concern with the iPhone Air.

The iPhone Air is more durable in other ways, too. Ways that I think are more important than bending. The front uses Apple’s new Ceramic Shield 2 coating, which the company says has 3x better scratch resistance. I haven’t tested this, but any improvement in scratch resistance is welcome. For years it’s felt like iPhone displays have gotten more durable against cracks, but at the expense of scratch resistance. I’m hopeful that Ceramic Shield 2 improves that balance. For the first time, the back of the iPhone Air also uses Ceramic Shield to protect against cracks and scratches. Again, I’ll leave it to the YouTubers to test that.

It’s obviously hard to truly test durability of an iPhone in one week. That said, I feel more confident about the iPhone Air’s durability than I thought I would.

Performance

The A19 Pro is the march of Apple Silicon continued. What’s most interesting here is Apple choosing to put the A19 Pro in the iPhone Air, rather than the base A19. The iPhone Air’s chip has a 6-core CPU and a 5-core GPU.

In benchmark results, the A19 Pro chip in the iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Pro comes in around 15% faster in multi-core CPU performance compared to last year’s A18 Pro chip. The GPU benchmarks around 15% faster than the A18 Pro GPU.

As I mentioned earlier, one important aspect of the design is that most of the compute for the iPhone Air is located in the plateau. This means that when the iPhone Air gets warm, most of the heat is concentrated along the top half of the back of the phone. On the plus side, this means the part of the phone you’re holding stays cool. On the other hand, I wonder how that thermal limitation will impact things in the long run.

One area that surprised me with the iPhone Air is RAM. While Apple doesn’t talk about it, the iPhone Air, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max all feature 12GB of RAM, up from 8GB in the iPhone 16 lineup. I didn’t expect to notice a difference here, but to my surprise it does feel like apps stay in memory longer on the iPhone Air than they do on my iPhone 16 Pro. The Reminders app, for example, stayed in memory across three different grocery stores, despite using a number of other apps (including Apple Maps) in between each of them.

Connectivity

In addition to the A19 Pro, the iPhone Air is powered by two first-of-their-kind Apple chips: the C1X and N1.

The former is the successor to the C1 modem that debuted with the iPhone 16e back in February. So rather than a modem from Qualcomm, the iPhone Air features a modem designed in-house by Apple itself. It’s something Apple been working on for years and the fruits of that labor are finally paying off.

Apple says the C1X is up to two times faster than the C1, and for “the same cellular technologies” even faster than the Qualcomm X71 5G modem in the iPhone 16 Pro while using 30% less energy overall.

The reason Apple specifically calls out “for the same cellular technologies” is because its C1X modem doesn’t support the ultra-fast mmWave 5G standard. mmWave 5G is most common in dense urban areas and crowded spaces like arenas. I use T-Mobile and have only encountered mmWave 5G once, so the lack of support on the iPhone Air has been a nonissue for me. If you are a mmWave 5G “unicorn,” you might find this omission more glaring.

My experience with the iPhone Air’s C1X modem has been twofold. In areas of strong 5G signal, the iPhone Air has consistently matched, and occasionally exceeded, download and upload speeds of my iPhone 16 Pro (both connected to T-Mobile). In areas of weaker 5G coverage, however, the iPhone Air pulls ahead. It consistently benchmarks around 15% to 20% faster than my iPhone 16 Pro. This is ideal as I’ve never found myself somewhere with great coverage hoping for faster speeds. The only time I even think about 5G speeds is when coverage is bad, and the C1X modem seems to really help in that regard.

The N1 wireless networking chip inside the iPhone Air, which handles Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread, is unexciting in the best way possible. If Apple hadn’t told me about this change, I’d have no idea. One tidbit that Apple specifically calls out is that the N1 improves overall performance reliability of things like Personal Hotspot and AirDrop. I plan to spend more time testing this in the coming weeks, but in some very rudimentary speed tests with Personal Hotspot I didn’t notice much change.

Camera

Perhaps the biggest compromise of the iPhone Air is the camera system. Instead of a two or three camera system, the iPhone Air features a single 48MP Fusion Main camera. No Ultra Wide or Telephoto camera found here.

In my week with the iPhone Air, I haven’t missed the Ultra Wide camera at all. Historically speaking, it’s the iPhone camera I use least. I have, however, missed the Telephoto camera. The iPhone’s Telephoto camera has become increasingly impressive in recent years, and to suddenly being an iPhone without it is a major adjustment. This is further exacerbated by the major improvements to the Telephoto camera on the iPhone 17 Pro models. If you use an iPhone Air, prepare to have some serious Telephoto fomo.

Apple says the iPhone Air has the equivalent of four lenses, which is clever marketing speak albeit slightly disingenuous. What it means when it says this is that you have four capture options in the Camera app: 1x Main, 1.1x Custom Main, 1.4x Custom Main, and 2x Telephoto.

iPhone Air: 48MP Main camera @ 1x

By default, the Main camera fuses a 48MP frame with a 12MP frame to create a 24MP image. You can also choose to capture full 48MP photos if you’d like. The 1.1x (28mm) and 1.4x (35mm) focal lengths capture 24MP images. Finally, the 2x Telephoto option uses the middle 12MP of the sensor to deliver what Apple says is optical-quality photos and videos.

The iPhone Air’s 48MP Fusion Main camera is excellent. It’s consistent across most lighting conditions and does a great job at managing shadows. The device also supports Apple’s latest Photographic Styles feature that first launched with the iPhone 16 last year, which I think is one of the best iPhone camera features in years. I use the “Amber” Photographic Style with these settings, but all the sample pictures in this story use Apple’s default “Standard” Photographic Style for consistency’s sake.

iPhone Air: 1x, 1.1x, 1.4x, 2x

iPhone Air: 1x, 1.1x, 1.4x, 2x, 10x

iPhone Air: 2x

The iPhone Air also features a new 18MP Center Stage front-facing camera. This marks the biggest update to the iPhone’s front-facing camera in years, and it’s more than just an increase in resolution. For the first time, the iPhone’s front-facing camera sensor is square. Apple explains that traditional sensors have a 4:3 aspect ratio, which limits framing based on the orientation of the phone. This is why you’ve always had to awkwardly rotate your iPhone to landscape mode to fit multiple people into a selfie.

With the iPhone Air, this is changing. The square sensor combined with Apple’s Center Stage technology means you don’t have to rotate your iPhone to take a landscape selfie. You can tap to expand the field of view, or the iPhone will use AI to expand the field of view and rotate to landscape orientation when it detects multiple people in the shot.

In addition to those improvements, the iPhone Air’s front-facing camera is higher resolution at 18MP versus the previous generation 12MP sensor. This leads to a noticeable improvement in selfie quality.

In my testing, the new Center Stage camera works impressively well. The increase in resolution is also immediately noticeable and allows you to see a lot more detail in the images as well as more accurate colors, particularly around skin. I’ll put some of my test images below, but I also encourage you to check out Tyler Stalman’s examples.

iPhone 17 selfie camera

Battery life

If the camera is the iPhone Air’s compromise, battery life is a close second. Here’s a comparison of iPhone battery life based on data Apple provides:

All of those numbers are good and well, and quite honestly they’re better than I expected for the iPhone Air. The question, of course, is how does this translate to real-world usage?

After a week, I can confidently say that I can’t make it through a full day on a single charge with the iPhone Air. On a good day, waking up at around 6:30 a.m., I can make just past dinner time before I’m out of juice. On a bad day, my iPhone Air is on the charger late afternoon. For my lifestyle, this isn’t a dealbreaker. I work from home and can charge at my desk. When it becomes a problem, though, is anytime I’m removed from my usual routine, like when traveling.

That’s where the MagSafe battery enters the equation, which attaches magnetically to the back of the iPhone Air and charges at 12W. After touting that the iPhone Air has “all-day battery life” during last week’s event, Apple also unveiled a MagSafe battery pack for the device. With the MagSafe battery attached, video playback increases to 40 hours and video playback (streamed) increases to 35 hours.

Battery life is also going to vary a lot from person to person. People use their phones in very different ways. I don’t think the iPhone Air’s battery life is a dealbreaker for me as someone who works from home, but it might be for you.

I’m hopeful that Apple can make further optimizations to the iPhone Air battery life with future software update.s

More tidbits

• The iPhone Air has a single speaker, located in the earpiece at the top of the device. There isn’t a speaker on the bottom like there is on other iPhone models. This was noticeable right away to me. If you regularly listen to podcasts or music using just your iPhone speakers (especially in the shower), you’ll want to invest in a Bluetooth speaker.
• The iPhone Air’s Dynamic Island is actually slightly lower on the display than other iPhone models. In practice this doesn’t mean much, but I’ve noticed a few notifications that expand from the Dynamic Island haven’t been updated to accommodate for that change.
• USB-C speeds are limited to USB 2 (up to 480 Mbps).
• The iPhone Air doesn’t charge as fast as the iPhone 17 models. You’ll get 50% in 30 minutes instead of 50% in 20 minutes.

9to5Mac’s Take

I referenced the iPhone X earlier as a point of design comparison. On paper, though, the difference between the iPhone X and iPhone Air couldn’t be more drastic. When the iPhone X was released, it was immediately the best iPhone ever. It was the first iPhone with an OLED screen, and incredibly thin bezels, and introduced the world to Face ID.

The iPhone Air isn’t the best iPhone ever made. It has compromises. It is, however, the most visually stunning iPhone that Apple has ever made. And there’s value in that, too.

The question, though, is who should buy the iPhone Air.

Here’s an interesting thought exercise. What happens when the “average” person walks into the Apple Store and asks an employee if they should buy a MacBook Air or MacBook Pro? I assume the Apple employee will explain that the MacBook Air is thinner and lighter, but still has great battery life, while it compromises on ports. The MacBook Pro, on the other hand, is thicker and heavier, super powerful, and has an abundance of ports, great battery life, and a great screen.

What happens if the “average” person walks into the Apple Store and asks if they should buy an iPhone Air or an iPhone 17 Pro? The iPhone Air is thinner and lighter and has the same chip as the iPhone 17 Pro, but it only has one camera and questionable (at best) battery life.

In the MacBook scenario, I think the majority of shoppers opt for the MacBook Air. In the iPhone scenario, I think the majority choose the iPhone 17 Pro (or maybe even the base iPhone 17).

My point is this: the differences between the iPhone Air and iPhone Pro are significantly bigger than the differences between the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro.

The single camera compromise is what will deter some people from buying the iPhone Air. I believe people are willing to compromise on battery life in exchange for the ultra-thin design. They can slap a battery on the back, carry a portable charger, or just make a more conscious effort to plug in whenever they have the chance. After all, the iPhone is more of a camera than it is a phone nowadays. I guarantee the majority of people use their iPhone’s camera(s) more than they use the actual phone functionality. It’s similar to buying a Mac. You can add more storage after the fact with an external drive, but you can’t add more RAM. With the iPhone Air, you can add more battery life, but you can’t add more cameras.

If Apple only sold the iPhone Air, that would be a problem. That’s not the case. The iPhone Air exists as part of what I believe is Apple’s best iPhone lineup ever. The base model iPhone 17 is the best base model iPhone ever released and the iPhone 17 Pro is Apple’s most “Pro” phone ever. The lineup targets the average shopper, the fashion-focused shopper, the nerd, and everyone in-between. Ultimately, I don’t know exactly how well the iPhone Air will sell, but I don’t think it will sell better than the iPhone 17 Pro. My guess is that it sells better than the iPhone mini and iPhone Plus models that previously existed as the awkward fourth child of Apple’s iPhone lineup. One thing I also hope Apple and pundits realize is that not every iPhone can be a best-seller.

To get back to my original point, who should buy the iPhone Air? If you want an iPhone that looks incredible and feels even better in the hand, the iPhone Air is for you. Just know that experience will come with tradeoffs, and it’s up to you to decide whether those tradeoffs are worth it. I really do think it’s that simple. I’ve seen so many people doing mental gymnastics trying to determine who should buy the iPhone Air, but it doesn’t need to be that complicated.

I’ll end with this: the iPhone Air feels like a line in the sand separating a tried and true design with something more ambitious. It’s the first time in years Apple has truly pushed the limit of the iPhone form factor, and I think it gives us a glimpse of where Apple thinks the iPhone is going next. It feels like the start of the iPhone’s next era, and I couldn’t be more excited.

Best iPhone 17 accessories

Follow Chance: Threads, Bluesky, Instagram, and Mastodon.