Apple Just Announced a New 'Affordable' iPhone
If you're in the market for a new iPhone, good news: Apple just announced one. Despite the company's big event planned for Wednesday, it decided to drop some product news early, including its newest "affordable" phone, the iPhone 17e. While affordable certainly doesn't mean "cheap," the "e-series" offers most of what you'd expect in an iPhone with a price tag lot lower than $1,000.
At first glance, the new iPhone 17e looks remarkably like the iPhone 16e. That's because the phones are functionally the same in design. You'll still get the same 6.1-inch display with 800 nits of brightness (1200 nits for HDR); the same overall dimensions, minus an extra .08 ounces; the same IP68 water and dust resistance; a single camera on the back that supports 4K Dolby Vision video; and the same battery life (Apple says 26 hours of video playback). But though there are many similarities, that doesn't mean these are the same iPhones. In fact, there are a number of upgrades that make the iPhone 17e an interesting choice, especially for the price.
A faster chip, and what else is new with the iPhone 17e
The big hardware upgrade here is the A19 chip: If you take a look at the Geekbench scores for the iPhone 17 (A19) and the iPhone 16e (A18), you'll see the advantage. The iPhone 17 scored 3627 in single-core, and 9249 in multi-core, with a GPU score of 37146. The 16e scored 3242 in single-core, 7976 in multi-core, and 23888. These are all numbers on paper, and we'll need to see how the A19 runs on the 17e itself, but there's a real leap here, especially in multi-core and GPU performance. That means even if you're coming from last year's iPhone, you should see improvements in intense games and professional workflows, though not as much for simpler tasks. (I don't think anyone is writing home about how fast Notes opens on an A19 iPhone.)
That's not to say the A19 alone is reason enough to upgrade from an iPhone 16e. It's true there are performance jumps, but they're not making the A18 obsolete, nor the A17 for that matter. In fact, Apple press release compares the speed of the iPhone 17e to the iPhone 11, which shows you how good the iPhones in between still are, even in 2026. Still, we have to acknowledge the hardware gains here: The A19 is a 3nm chip, with a four-core GPU featuring "Neural Accelerators," which Apple says gives games a boost.
A faster modem
The 17e also gets the C1X, Apple's in-house modem. The company says this hardware is up to two times faster than the C1 modem in the iPhone 16e, and uses 30% less energy than the modem in the iPhone 16 Pro. That may help increase battery life when out and about, while maintaining speeds when connected to cellular networks.
A "better" camera
While the 17e still has one rear camera, Apple says it benefits from some improvements—namely, it's now a "48MP Fusion" camera, with "optical-quality 2x Telephoto." Optical-quality is not optical, as this lens won't actually "zoom," but Apple seems to say the larger sensor can mimic the quality of a 2x camera. While the iPhone 16e supports Portrait mode with depth control, Apple says the 17e supports "next-generation portraits" with depth and focus control.
A more durable display
One small upgrade that actually will make a big difference is Ceramic Shield 2. This is the display tech that the rest of the iPhone 17 series comes with, and, surprisingly, is one of my favorite features of my 17 Pro Max. Apple says the new glass has three times the scratch resistance, and while I can't speak to those numbers exactly, I haven't seen a single scratch on my screen since buying my phone (knock on wood).
MagSafe charging
The iPhone 17e also supports MagSafe, something the iPhone 16e was missing. That means the new iPhone supports first and third-party MagSafe accessories, but also Apple's faster Qi2 wireless charging, with a 15W or 20W adapter or higher.
How to buy the iPhone 17e
The iPhone 17e starts at $599 for 256GB of storage—double the amount the 16e starts with. (That's effectively a price cut right there.) You can also choose to upgrade to 512GB for $799. It's available in black, white, or soft pink.
Apple says the iPhone 17e will be available to preorder starting March 4, likely after its big keynote presentation, and will be available to buy starting March 11. Curiously, that's the same day Samsung is launching the Galaxy S26 series.