With speculation mounting about Apple’s plans for an ultra-thin iPhone 17 Air launching alongside this year’s iPhone 17 lineup, a new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman claims Apple at one point considered removing the charging port entirely—making it the company’s first-ever portless iPhone.
Writing in his weekly Power On newsletter, Gurman said the iPhone 17 Air will feature the C1 chip, Apple’s first in-house 5G modem. This chip debuted in the iPhone 16e and is also set to power the iPhone 17 Air. However, like the 16e, this means the 17 Air won’t support mmWave 5G, though Apple still markets the 16e as offering “Superfast 5G cellular.”
“Skinnier phones require thinner batteries, and that often means fewer hours of battery life,” Gurman wrote. “Apple didn’t want to compromise here, so it sent engineers back to the drawing board to redesign display and silicon components, as well as software, to make the device more efficient.”
He also suggested that the iPhone 17 Air will foreshadow a shift to slimmer, portless iPhones in the future.
“The iPhone 17 Air represents the beginning of a sea change for Apple,” Gurman wrote. “If this model proves successful, Apple intends to revisit the idea of port-free iPhones and move more models toward this slimmer design.”
iPhone 17 Air: What We Know So Far
Here’s a roundup of the biggest iPhone 17 Air rumors so far:
- Ultra-thin design, potentially the thinnest iPhone yet
- C1 Apple modem, replacing Qualcomm chips (but no mmWave support)
- Redesigned display, silicon, and battery for improved efficiency
- Potential removal of the charging port (though not confirmed)
- 6.6-inch OLED display with ProMotion
Apple is expected to unveil the iPhone 17 lineup later this year.
The post Apple considered dropping charging port from iPhone 17 model, report claims first appeared on The Apple Post.
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