Why I’ll Probably Upgrade to the IPhone 17 Base Version
The iPhone 17 is the most affordable of the four iPhones Apple unveiled at its September 2025 “Awe Dropping” event , and that automatically makes it the most interesting to me. It may seem like the most “boring” at first glance, but as I noted when comparing it to the iPhone Air , the iPhone 17 is probably the best new iPhone for most people. It’s affordable, comes with some nice new features including a ProMotion display with a 120Hz refresh rate, and has most of the features typically reserved for more expensive iPhones. Here’s everything you need to know about the iPhone 17 and why you should upgrade.
iPhone 17 Body, Display and Weight
The iPhone 17 is the most colorful option of the four iPhones that will be released in September 2025. You can choose from five finishes, including lavender, sage (a green shade), smoky blue, white, and black.
This phone has a ProMotion display with a 120Hz refresh rate, which gives you smoother navigation and animations that were previously only available on Pro models . You can also use it for gaming and watching videos. Plus, to save battery, the phone can reduce the refresh rate to 1Hz when the display is not in use.
The iPhone 17 also features a slightly larger 6.3-inch Super Retina XDR display with Ceramic Shield 2 for improved scratch resistance. With support for a 1Hz refresh rate, the phone also supports Apple’s Always-On Display feature, which means you can quickly check the time without turning on the screen.
Apple says the iPhone 17 is waterproof to a depth of 6 meters for 30 minutes. This means that if you drop your phone in water, it will be safe as long as it’s not deeper than that.
Apple still managed to make this phone fairly light, at 6.24 ounces (177 grams). That makes it heavier than the iPhone Air (5.82 ounces or 165 grams), but it should still be fairly comfortable to hold.
iPhone 17 processor
The iPhone 17 features Apple’s new A19 chip, and it’s the only one of the four new iPhones to use it. All other phones announced at Apple’s September 2025 event use the A19 Pro chip. The A19 has a 6-core CPU and 5-core GPU with neural accelerators. At the time of writing, early Geekbench results give us a good idea of the A19’s performance . It appears to score about 7 to 8 percent faster than the A18 chip in the iPhone 16. According to the same report, the iPhone 17 has 8GB of RAM. Apple doesn’t publish RAM specs, but benchmarking tools are a reliable indicator of this metric.
This phone supports two eSIM cards and does not have physical SIM card slots in the US. In some regions, such as India, the iPhone 17 has one physical SIM card slot and one eSIM slot. In China, the iPhone 17 does not support eSIM at all and comes with two physical SIM card slots.
iPhone 17 cameras
Apple has equipped the iPhone 17 with two rear cameras in addition to the front-facing Center Stage camera. The main innovation is that you no longer need to rotate your iPhone to take landscape shots . The Center Stage camera with an 18-megapixel sensor uses artificial intelligence to automatically adjust the frame to include more people in the frame if necessary. It can take both portrait and landscape selfies.
The main camera has a 48-megapixel main sensor and a 48-megapixel ultra-wide lens. This means you can take photos at 0.5x, 1x, and 2x zoom. The iPhone 17 also supports Dual Capture, which lets you record video on both the front and rear cameras at the same time. The rear cameras support macro photography and can record Dolby Vision video at up to 4K resolution and 60 frames per second.
iPhone 17 battery life
The iPhone 17 will easily last a full day on a single charge with moderate use. Apple claims the device lasts up to 30 hours of continuous video playback, which is more than the iPhone Air (27 hours) and even the iPhone 16 Plus (also 27 hours). The iPhone 17 supports Apple MagSafe and Qi2 wireless charging. You can charge it from 0 to 50 percent in 30 minutes using a 30W or higher adapter paired with a MagSafe charger. If you purchase Apple’s 40W adapter, your iPhone 17 will charge from 0 to 50 percent in 20 minutes.
The smartphone has a USB-C port, but it only supports USB 2, which means that the data transfer speed will not be as high as on the iPhone 17 Pro (which supports USB 3 with speeds up to 10 Gbps).
Nice upgrade and great price
Overall, the iPhone 17 feels like a solid upgrade, with a better display, longer battery life, and better cameras. It’s not a game-changer, but it won’t disappoint those upgrading from an older phone. If your iPhone 16 series is working fine, you’ll probably get at least another year out of it. But if you’re like me and have an iPhone 12 Pro Max, or an iPhone 15 or earlier, the 17 could be a great upgrade.
For me, as someone looking to upgrade, the iPhone 17’s price ($799 for the 256GB version ) is especially attractive given all the features it comes with. If you need more space, the 512GB iPhone 17 is $999, which should be enough for everything you can download.