Quick summary
Reports of a dramatic iPhone 17 redesign have been dismissed by a well-connected leaker.
They say any changes to the iPhone 17 Pro camera bump will be minor.
Yesterday we reported on a rumoured iPhone 17 redesign and said that if it were true, we'd eat our hat. It looks like we won't be tucking into any millinery any time soon, because a well connected leaker says that we were right to disbelieve it.
The redesign showed the camera bump changed into a lozenge spanning the full width of the iPhone 17, rather like the camera bar in the Google Pixel. So much so, in fact, that we suggested that the render had simply plopped a bit of a Pixel onto the back of an iPhone.
Now, leaker Instant Digital has said that there is going to be a design change. But it isn't this one.
Is the iPhone 17 Pro getting a radical redesign?
Posting on Weibo, as reported by MacRumors, Instant Digital says that the back of the iPhone 17 Pro is a little different. However, there's no lozenge-shaped camera bump – the camera bit will retain the same basic triangular shape it has now, with two camera lenses mounted vertically and a third to the right of them, halfway up.
Clearly both sets of predictions can't be correct. But we're inclined to trust Instant Digital a bit more, because they previously predicted the release of the yellow iPhone 14 and the change of camera position in the iPad Air, among others.
Instant Digital's post also corresponds with multiple recent reports that say the iPhone 17 range isn't going to get a significant redesign; the attention-grabbing change in 2025 is expected to be the launch of the iPhone 17 Air, a much slimmer iPhone boasting Apple's latest modem chip and with a slightly less impressive camera system than the Pro and Pro Max.
However, some reports suggest that Apple may switch the Pros from their current titanium frames to aluminium ones instead while keeping the basic design largely unchanged.
