Rough time distribution across the devices launched this year:
Opening — 5 minutes
iPhone 18 Pro / Pro Max — 25 minutes
AirPods 5 — 5 minutes
Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4 — 20 minutes
iPhone Duo — 25 minutes
Every product got the stage time it deserved, though I did hope the iPhone Duo would get a longer introduction, given it's Apple's first foldable. I guess the problem is that with Samsung, Motorola and Google working in this space for the past half decade, it would have been pretentious to walk through mature features instead of focusing on the actual innovation here: the software UI/UX.
A few thoughts as I was watching:
The iPhone 18 Pro series gets minor improvements — variable aperture, better performance, better battery life.
The Siri AI promise is finally being delivered, but I'm not sure people still care.
From my experience in the industry, pro features (pro mode included) rarely get used by regular consumers. I wonder if the variable aperture will trigger automatically in auto mode.
As the iPhone settles into its "endgame" form factor, AirPods are hitting a similar point: the hardware has been refined down to a minimalist shape that can't accommodate drastic innovation anymore. Better noise cancellation is almost a non-selling selling point.
Given what Apple customers can afford, a $20 gap between two SKUs — the biggest difference being the wireless charging case — seems trivial to me. There are probably channel-related business reasons for keeping two SKUs under one name.
The Apple Watch Series 12's lineup of AI features will kill a bunch of AI apps like Granola.
Packaging them as assistive features looks like Apple trying to sidestep privacy litigation.
Unlike iPhone and AirPods, the Apple Watch still has a long way to go before it reaches its final form factor. Apple can keep packing more sensors into that thin body — not to mention the taptic engine still takes up a lot of internal space.
Oh, the ceramic case is back. With a hefty price tag: double the aluminum version, and $200 more than titanium.
Cont'd: AppleCare still costs the same as it does on the aluminum version, so it's well worth the investment here.
The Apple Watch Ultra 4 is now $100 cheaper than the Series 12 Ceramic. Pick a side.
One more thing!!!
John said "hub" without referring to the Home Hub and my heart stopped for a second. #predictionmarketinsiderjoke
The iPhone Duo's open/close animation is peak Apple magic. Better than the Face ID reveal at the iPhone X launch.
I could literally watch that animation for an hour — in renders, in hands-on videos, doesn't matter. It deserves a design award.
The wake-up lamp during the alarm shows someone at Apple still cares about the details.
More people will finally discover the drag-and-drop gesture on iPhone, two (or three?) years after it was introduced.
Under-display camera: definitely an NPS disaster. It'll probably stay for another generation purely out of Apple's pride.
The creaseless hinge isn't really creaseless, according to some hands-on videos.
It costs $1999 about as much as an iPad mini plus an iPhone Pro — and neither of those has the folding animation.
Yes, the iPhone Duo does support MagSafe and wireless charging.
Is the nano-texture display quietly cheating its way around the crease?
At 254 grams, the iPhone Duo is the heaviest iPhone yet. #poorlittlepinky
No spatial video support, so it isn't compatible with Vision Pro.