The iPhone 17 Pro Max comes with some big upgrades, some curious changes, and a design, which we will be talking about over the next year
The iPhone 17 Pro Max had a lot to make up for this year, but also had to show up with upgrades that would solidify its lead. or at least a need to buy that over the last iPhone 16 Pro Max.
Since the iPhone 15 series, we’ve had the super-powered 3 nm chips from Apple. But they tended to overheat. Since 2023, Apple has been using a tetraprism lens for optical zoom but lacking in the digital crop-in while competitors were pushing 100x and beyond. In 2024, Apple promised a plethora of game-changing AI features. Few of them came to be.
To be real, the iPhone 17 Pro Max doesn’t come in with a full arsenal of over-the-top upgrades that remedy all of these points. Max zoom has been upgraded a little, but nothing mind-blowing. AI features are still supposedly incoming, but Apple made sure to not make any huge promises this time around. Instead, Cupertino focused on what’s here, what’s now, and what functions.
And what does the iPhone 17 Pro Max have to show for itself? A new aluminum chassis that has been designed in a way to dissipate heat much more effectively, combined with a vapor cooling chamber inside — finally. A new camera system that is very, very good. An increase in battery life that is always welcome. And performance — the type of performance you will write home about. But you will also mention a few of the bugs that iOS 26 ships with — hopefully that 26.1 update comes soon.
In our PhoneArena Review Rating, the iPhone 17 Pro scores 7.9 points, a slight upgrade over the 7.7 score of the 16 Pro. A lot of that comes from just the boost in performance speeds and charging, while the camera changes have not affected the scoring much as colors and dynamic range remain largely the same.
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Here’s a quick overview of the iPhone 17 Pro Max specs and how they compare to the predecessor:
iPhone 17 Pro Design and Display
We can’t not talk about it — the camera plateau. It’s the thing that stuck out the most during leaks, it’s the first thing you see when you spot a new iPhone 17 Pro or Pro Max. Well, it’s either that or the orange color.
So, I don’t mind the plateau. Especially since, unlike the old iPhone Plus models, which simply inflated the size of a standard iPhone, warts and all, the new iPhone 17 Pro Max’s proportions have been appropriately touched up. That is to say, that the Pro Max’s camera plateau didn’t simply get inflated with the size of the phone to a point where it gets comically large. It looks. appropriate.
Sure, maybe it’ll need a bit of adjustment, but rest assured that this bold new look is probably already deemed desirable by some. The best part about it — you can rest it against your finger while gripping the phone, and when you lay it on a table, it hardly wobbles. Yeah, hardly — unlike Google’s camera vizors, the camera plateau of the iPhone still has lens rings sticking out that kind of make its back uneven. Again.
So, big, unmissable camera hump aside, the rest of the phone feels very familiar. Slightly tapered edges make it soft on the palm, and the matte aluminum helps too. Oh yes, aluminum — the titanium frame came and went in just two years’ time. Apple did say that it was bad at heat dissipation, making it sound as if the aluminum build is an upgrade. Funny, when 6-7 years ago, aluminum was for the «cheap» iPhones, and the Pro models got stainless steel.
The thin bezels around the screen are as beautiful than ever, and those stock wallpapers complement the design so well — making it impossible to see where the screen ends and the frame begins. Oh, they also cleverly hide the Dynamic Island, too.
Cracking open the iPhone 17 Pro box won’t really surprise anyone who has handled an Apple device in the past few years. The packaging is as lean as ever — a slim box with the phone resting on top, a neatly braided USB-C cable tucked underneath, and a quick set of leaflets that few of us actually read. The big news this year is that the Pro line finally supports up to 40 W fast charging. The catch? There’s no charger in the box, so if you want to see those speeds, you’ll probably need to invest in a fresh brick. Unless you’ve already bought one of these universal muti-device chargers.
With a 6.9-inch ProMotion screen, the 17 Pro Max display size is unchanged from the previous model. But there’s a big upgrade hiding here — a new peak brightness of 3,000 nits. Plus, the aforementioned vapor chamber and heat dissipation seem to be doing some good work here, as the iPhone 17 series aren’t so quick to go dim when used under direct sunlight, too.
Color charts show a pretty accurate display, pulling slightly towards the greens and yellows — often seen on pentile OLED panels. Still, Apple holds it together here, but it’s worth noting that the Google Pixel 10 Pro XL measures slightly more accurate. Hardly differences that can be observed with the naked eye, and with the True Tone and Night Shift mode — you always have an algorithm adjusting those colors to match the current ambiance. So, it’s more about the user experience — and our experience with the iPhone 17 Pro Max screen is that it’s an excellent and mostly accurate display.
Apple also talked up a new anti-glare coating on the screen. My hopes were up, as Samsung’s S24 Ultra and S25 Ultra have this excellent anti-reflection glass that changed the game. Apple’s new solution isn’t as strong, but there’s a mild improvement for sure:
For biometrics, it’s the tried and true Face ID. Fast, reliable, and quite improved over the years since release (which was with the iPhone X, back in 2017).
iPhone 17 Pro Camera
OK, spoiler alert, the camera plateau is not there because of the cameras. Not really — it’s about having room for the internal hardware, better antennas, and the aforementioned heat management.
