The SE 3 is gone. The more expensive but more capable iPhone 16e is here:
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Yep, much more capable.
Unfortunately it’ll also be out of reach of some people who would have bought at approx $450 (or more likely over a 2 or 3 year contract).
At a point when Apple is trying to sell iphones to new people to then earn extra revenue out of them, this seems like a strange move.
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I think the lack of MagSafe is a weird one.
I see that some companies are making “MagSafe cases”, by which they mean they have the little ring for accessories. And I’m sure the cases will magnet onto the chargers, which will charge them at the reduced Qi speed.
But it’s kind of weird for Apple to remove a feature that’s also the key to a whole line of accessory sales.
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This is entirely about our family’s wants, not what Apple should do: I’m disappointed by the SE/e moving upmarket. We’ll probably keep buying refurb 3rd gens until it’s too close to the OS update cutoff. $400 (or $150-300 refurb) was nice.
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Twas hoping for the Mini Chasis. The Mini is truly dead.
I agree. At first glance, based on the cost of an iPhone 15 today, this years iPhone 16 will be a better deal next year than a 16E.
That does raise the question of whether the former SE line is going to get revved every year now. If the 16E goes away and is replaced by a 17E (with corresponding processor bump) that would solve that problem from Apple’s point of view.
I am excited that this is the phone that they have their own in-house Cell Modem. Means a Cellular MacBook is more in the cards now more than ever.
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Will it? I had planned to wait for the iPhone 17 until I heard that it might contain an Apple cellular modem. I didn’t want to risk a repeat of the iPhone 7 (Intel vs Qualcomm modem) situation.
The 16E seems to be priced to make it easier to upsell a customer to a “just a bit” more expensive model.
The rumours for months have been that the SE would move much closer to the standard iPhone.
I also think it’s sad that there’s no small phone
I’m an extremely happy SE 3 user. Not even remotely interested in the 16e. At that pricepoint, I’d rather pay more for magsafe and a better camera.
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Well by that time there will have been 2/3 of a year with Apple’s modems deployed in the 16E. I would think we’d have enough data by then to know whether they’re good or not.
The pricing in the EU is crazy high.
I was actually waiting for this, as I know someone for whom an SE would be a great fit. I was already on the verge of recommending this when it launches, but this price hike is disappointing. A used 15 is a much more sensible buy, and at this price point, so are many Androids.
True. But I figured why wait to find out?
There is a non-zero chance that the Apple modems are inferior to Qualcomm. And there is no chance, IMO, that the iPhone 17 will be a quantum leap ahead of the iPhone 16.
We have to see if this is a modem leap on par with the Intel to Apple Silicon transition on the processor side. Apple’s in-house manufacturing hasn’t let me down yet in terms of performance.
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This will never happen because of Carrier partnerships but I would absolutely be in favor of Apple having an in-house carrier as a part of Apple One to go against Verizon, T-Mobile and AT&T. (Says what I think about them that I’d be willing to entertain that monopoly.)
That’s not worth the pricing hike alone, especially not from the European perspective, where the networks are pretty good, and we do not particularly care (nor ask) which cellular modem is in there.
The now-dead SE was aimed at those who care about that sort of stuff the least, and I’m afraid the 16e is just another confusing addition to the iPhone lineup.
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Oh you’re not wrong. As a phone it just makes it a muddled mess.
But, I really really want a Cellular MacBook this gets us closer because there was 0 chance that Apple was going to let Qualcom be a part of the MacBook motherboard.
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Apple would probably need to hire around 100,000 new employees and set up 30,000 or 40,000 call centers just to handle the US. I would prefer they spend the next 5 - 10 years working on Siri 
I fully agree with that. I would love to see MacBooks with cellular.