Every year we hear about “the biggest iPhone update ever” and while its accuracy varies, today we have before you the biggest iPhone ever – the iPhone 16 Pro Max.
Let’s unbox it right away before we go any further. You get a nice braided USB-C cable and a SIM tool – enjoy them while you can, we have a feeling they’re on their way out too.
Apple has packed a truly enormous 6.9-inch display into the Pro Max this year, but it doesn’t feel like a huge iPhone. That’s because Apple also thinned the bezels, and the upsizing doesn’t feel all that drastic. Still, aside from its unchanged 8.3mm thickness, this year’s big iPhone is a touch larger than its predecessor in every dimension.
Besides the bigger screen and chip update, the biggest new feature on the iPhone 16 Pro Max is the new camera control button, which is a truly innovative concept. It’s an actual button – you press it to open the camera app from any screen (double-press it when on a locked phone), but it can also sense a press and open up a deeper layer of controls, and you can swipe across it.
We love the new button for its ability to open the camera app from anywhere, but it does take some time to get used to. Our initial impressions are that it’s better suited to portraits and right-handers – it’s far from the most comfortable in landscape mode.
Returning to the size of the iPhone 16 Pro Max – here it sits next to the Google Pixel 9 Pro XL and the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. The iPhone dwarfs the Pixel, but doesn’t appear to have a larger screen than the Galaxy when you put the two side by side.
The big boys – Galaxy S24 Ultra, iPhone 16 Pro Max, Pixel 9 Pro XL
We’ve started writing the iPhone 16 Pro Max review, but there’s still a lot of testing to be done, so be patient!