The iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max are

smartphone A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as multi ...

s that were developed and marketed by

Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Comput ...

They are the seventeenth-generation flagship

iPhones The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at M ...

, succeeding the iPhone 14 Pro and 14 Pro Max. The devices were unveiled alongside the lower-priced iPhone 15 and 15 Plus during the Apple Event at

Apple Park Apple Park, also known as Apple Campus 2, is the corporate headquarters of Apple Inc., located in Cupertino, California, United States. It was opened to employees in April 2017, while construction was still underway. It replaced Apple Campus as ...

Cupertino, California Cupertino ( ) is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States, directly west of San Jose, California, San Jose on the western edge of the Santa Clara Valley with portions extending into the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. The ...

, on September 12, 2023. Pre-orders began on September 15, and the devices were made available to the general public on September 22. The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max were discontinued on September 9, 2024, following the announcement of the iPhone 16 Pro and 16 Pro Max. Similar to the iPhone 15, the 15 Pro replaced the proprietary

Lightning Lightning is a natural phenomenon consisting of electrostatic discharges occurring through the atmosphere between two electrically charged regions. One or both regions are within the atmosphere, with the second region sometimes occurring on ...

connector with

USB-C USB-C, or USB Type-C, is a 24-pin reversible Electrical connector, connector (not a Communication protocol, protocol) that supersedes previous USB hardware#Connectors, USB connectors (also supersedes Mini DisplayPort and Lightning (connector) ...

. They also support

Apple Intelligence Apple Intelligence is an artificial intelligence system developed by Apple Inc. Relying on a combination of on-device and server processing, it was announced on June 10, 2024, at Worldwide Developers Conference#2024, WWDC 2024, as a built-in fe ...

, which uses AI to prioritize privacy-centric functions.

Design

The iPhone 15 Pro marks the first significant redesign of the device's outer shell since the iPhone 12 Pro in 2020, with rounded edges, a subtly curved display, and back glass. The enclosure of the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max is made of grade 5

titanium Titanium is a chemical element; it has symbol Ti and atomic number 22. Found in nature only as an oxide, it can be reduced to produce a lustrous transition metal with a silver color, low density, and high strength, resistant to corrosion in ...

, unlike the stainless steel frame of previous Pro models. The display bezels have also been reduced from 2.2mm to 1.55mm. The phone is available in four colors: natural

, blue titanium, white titanium, and black titanium. It is also the first premium iPhone since the

iPhone X The iPhone X (Roman numerals, Roman numeral "X" pronounced "ten") is a smartphone that was developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is part of the List of iPhone models, 11th generation of the iPhone. Available for pre-order from September 26, 2 ...

to not come in the gold color option. IPhone Pro

Specifications

Hardware

Like the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus, the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max replace the proprietary

connector with

to comply with the European Union mandating the use of this connector in smartphones with Directive (EU) 2022/2380 in 2022. Apple had already started to introduce USB-C to its handheld devices beginning with the third generation iPad Pro, released in 2018. The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max support

AV1 AOMedia Video 1 (AV1) is an open, royalty-free video coding format initially designed for video transmissions over the Internet. It was developed as a successor to VP9 by the Alliance for Open Media (AOMedia), a consortium founded in 2015 tha ...

video hardware decoding. In

iOS 18 iOS 18 is the eighteenth and current major release of Apple's iOS operating system for the iPhone. It was announced on June 10, 2024, at the 2024 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). It was made publicly available on September 16, 2024, as ...

, the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max are the first iPhones to be capable of supporting the new

AI features, due to the increased amount of

DRAM Dram, DRAM, or drams may refer to: Technology and engineering * Dram (unit), a unit of mass and volume, and an informal name for a small amount of liquor, especially whisky or whiskey * Dynamic random-access memory, a type of electronic semicondu ...

in these models and their fast 35 trillion-operation-per-second Neural Engine. File:IPhone 15 Pro.jpeg, iPhone 15 Pro with 6.1-inch display File:IPhone 15 Pro Max.jpeg, iPhone 15 Pro Max with 6.7-inch display

Chipset

The iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max feature the Apple A17 Pro

system on a chip A system on a chip (SoC) is an integrated circuit that combines most or all key components of a computer or Electronics, electronic system onto a single microchip. Typically, an SoC includes a central processing unit (CPU) with computer memory, ...

(SoC). It is built on

TSMC Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC or Taiwan Semiconductor) is a Taiwanese multinational semiconductor contract manufacturing and design company. It is one of the world's most valuable semiconductor companies, the world' ...

's N3B

fabrication process Semiconductor device fabrication is the process used to manufacture semiconductor devices, typically integrated circuits (ICs) such as microprocessors, microcontrollers, and memories (such as Random-access memory, RAM and flash memory). It is a ...

. It features a redesigned Apple

graphics processing unit A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a specialized electronic circuit designed for digital image processing and to accelerate computer graphics, being present either as a discrete video card or embedded on motherboards, mobile phones, personal ...

(GPU) which adds hardware-accelerated ray tracing; during the reveal event, Apple announced that games such as ''

Death Stranding ''Death Stranding'' is a 2019 action-adventure game developed by Kojima Productions and originally published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It is the first game from director Hideo Kojima and Kojima Productions after their split from Konam ...

'', ''

Resident Evil Village ''Resident Evil Village'' is a 2021 survival horror game developed and published by Capcom. It is the sequel to ''Resident Evil 7: Biohazard'' (2017) and the eighth numbered mainline game of the ''Resident Evil'' series. Players control Ethan Wi ...

'' and ''

Assassin's Creed Mirage ''Assassin's Creed Mirage'' is a 2023 action-adventure game developed by Ubisoft Bordeaux and published by Ubisoft. The game is the thirteenth major installment in the ''Assassin's Creed'' series and the successor to ''Assassin's Creed Valhalla' ...

'' (all games originally designed for consoles and PCs) would come to

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

in the future.

Charging and transfer speeds

The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max use

with USB 3.2 Gen 2 transfer speeds (est. up to 10

Gbit/s In telecommunications, data transfer rate is the average number of bits ( bitrate), characters or symbols ( baudrate), or data blocks per unit time passing through a communication link in a data-transmission system. Common data rate units are mu ...

or 1.25 GB/s), an improvement over the

iPhone 14 Pro The iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max are smartphones that were developed and marketed by Apple Inc. They are the List of iPhone models, sixteenth generation flagship iPhones, succeeding the iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max. The devices were unveil ...

or 14 Pro Max and the

iPhone 15 The iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus are smartphones developed and marketed by Apple. They are the seventeenth generation of iPhones, succeeding the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus. The devices were announced on September 12, 2023, during the App ...

or 15 Plus base models which only have

USB 2.0 Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard, developed by USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), for digital data transmission and power delivery between many types of electronics. It specifies the architecture, in particular the physical i ...

transfer speeds (est. up to 480 Mbit/s or 60 MB/s).

Video output

All iPhone 15 models have support for DisplayPort Alternate Mode over USB-C video output with HDR up to

4K resolution 4K resolution refers to a horizontal display resolution of approximately 4,000 pixels. Digital television and digital cinematography commonly use several different 4K resolutions. In television and consumer media, 38402160 (4K UHD) with a 16:9 asp ...

Action button

The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max feature an Action button, replacing the mute switch that was present on every iPhone before it. The function of the Action button can be configured by the user, but by default, the Action button toggles silent mode. Other options include: opening a desired app, recording a voice memo, toggling a focus mode, and actively translating speech. In 2025, Apple revealed that the ability to trigger Visual Intelligence via the action button would be added to the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max through the iOS 18.4 update.

Software

The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max launched with

iOS 17 iOS 17 is the seventeenth major release of Apple's iOS operating system for the iPhone. It is the direct successor to iOS 16. It was announced on June 5, 2023, at Apple's annual Worldwide Developers Conference alongside watchOS 10, iPadOS 1 ...

and is compatible with

released in September 2024. Apple announced that the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max are compatible with

released with iOS 18.1 in October 2024. Consistent with the UK Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure regulations, it will continue to receive major software updates for a minimum of five years to at least 2028. Prior to the launch of iOS 18.4, Apple added the Visual Intelligence support for the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max. The users of the iPhone 15 Pro or iPhone 15 Pro Max can open the Visual Intelligence by customizing the Action button or Lock Screen, or opening Control Center.

Detailed specs

Hardware issues reported

Overheating

Some owners claimed that their iPhones were suffering from overheating issues, reportedly reaching temperatures as high as . Apple has also said that the phone's titanium frame "does not contribute to the heating issue." In addition, Apple stated the cause of iPhones overheating was a software bug. Apple has attempted to address the overheating issue with iOS 17.0.3 update.

Power bank reverse charging

Some owners have found that power banks designed for

devices are not working correctly with the iPhone. Some banks will not charge the iPhone at all or the iPhone will attempt to charge the power bank instead.

NFC

Some owners of

BMW Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, trading as BMW Group (commonly abbreviated to BMW (), sometimes anglicised as Bavarian Motor Works), is a German multinational manufacturer of vehicles and motorcycles headquartered in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. Th ...

vehicles using its wireless charging system with the iPhone have found that the NFC chip in charge of

Apple Pay Apple Pay is a mobile payment service by Apple Inc. that allows users to make payments in person, in iOS apps, and on the web. Supported on iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, Mac, and Vision Pro, Apple Pay digitizes and can replace a credit or debi ...

and also digital car keys can stop working correctly. Apple has attempted to fix these issues with

17.1.1 and 17.2 updates.

Durability

A durability test video for the iPhone 15 Pro Max showed that the back glass was more prone to cracking after the content creator

JerryRigEverything Zack Nelson (born June 29, 1988), better known as JerryRigEverything, is an American YouTuber, internet personality and founder of a business that makes off-road wheelchairs. He is known for teardown videos where he takes various tech products ...

applied pressure on the back glass, which caused it to crack, saying that it was unexpected. A later video, published by the same YouTuber, cited that the possible reason for this was that the back glass is no longer glued to a metal plate; this change, and the hollow spots on the phone, may cause the back glass to crack if pressure was applied on those hollow spots; on the durability test video, in some angles, the glass is noticeably caved in to the phone, further proving that it broke due to a hollow spot on the phone. Additional testing by Consumer Reports found that the durability of the iPhone 15 Pro Max was generally excellent, with the back glass not breaking after 50 drops.

Repairability

A September 2023 report by

iFixit iFixit ( ) is an American e-commerce and how-to website that publishes free wiki-like online repair guides and tear-downs of consumer electronics and gadgets. It also sells repair parts, tools, and accessories. It is a private company in San Luis ...

found that repairability on the new iPhones was much worse compared to the 14 series due to various software locking issues, forcing people to buy new parts and repair machines specifically by Apple.

Release and critical reception

The devices were unveiled in 2023, alongside the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus during the September 12 Apple Event at

. Pre-orders began on September 15, and the devices were made available to the general public on September 22. The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max were discontinued on September 9, 2024, following the announcement of the iPhone 16 Pro and 16 Pro Max. ''GSMarena'' gave the phone 4.5 out of 5 stars. While its display, camera and speakers were praised, its high price was noted as a weak point. ''NotebookCheck'' gave it 91 out of 100 and praised its durability.

References

External links

* * – official website {{Apple Inc. hardware *15 Pro Mobile phones introduced in 2023 Products and services discontinued in 2024 Mobile phones with 4K video recording Mobile phones with multiple rear cameras Discontinued flagship smartphones