The iPhone 17 Air could hit the market next year as Apple’s thinnest smartphone ever
The iPhone 16 range launched in September, but details about Apple’s next generation of smartphones have already emerged online. According to recent reports, the Cupertino-based company could discontinue the iPhone Plus model next year and replace it with an iPhone 17 Slim version. A well-known analyst now states that the alleged Slim model will be thinner than the iPhone 6. Moreover, the analysts claimed that Apple’s next-generation A19 chips for the iPhone 17 series will be manufactured using updated technology from TSMC.
iPhone 17 Air could be just 6mm thick
Jeff Pu of Haitong International Tech Research in his latest research note (via MacRumors) claims that the iPhone 17 Air will be approximately 6mm thick. “We agreed with the recent rumor of an ultra-slim, 6mm thick design of the iPhone 17 Slim model,” the analyst said.
Apple’s thinnest iPhone to date is the iPhone 6 with a thickness of 6.9 mm. If the latter claim turns out to be true, the iPhone 17 Air will be Apple’s thinnest iPhone ever. The latest iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max have a thickness of 8.25mm, while the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus are slimmer at 7.8mm.
The analyst reportedly stated this Apple’s A19 and A19 Pro chips for the iPhone 17 series will be manufactured using TSMC’s latest third-generation 3nm process called ‘N3P’. Both iPhone 17 and iPhone 17 Air are said to run on the A19 chip, while the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are said to come with the A19 Pro chip.
The current A18 and A18 Pro chips for the iPhone 16 series are built with TSMC’s second-generation 3nm process known as ‘N3E’. The A17 Pro chip that powers the iPhone 15 Pro series is based on TSMC’s first-generation 3nm process ‘N3B’.
The A19 chips manufactured using the N3P process are said to offer greater transistor density. Therefore, we can expect iPhone 17 models to offer better performance and energy efficiency compared to the iPhone 16 models.
