The next iPhone - 2017
 

So what will it be? Tradition dictates it will be the 7s, with minor improvements over the 7. But the 7 seems to be a 2nd minor cycle, and there are plenty of rumors of a radically revised phone next year.

iPhone 8? Going the Sybase route and stepping it up to the iPhone 10, for the 10th anniversary?

Still next September? There are lots of rumors - more than typical a year out.

I'm going with the iPhone 8 in April, 2017.

I hope for the following:

*Radical design change
*Wireless charging
*OLED screens
*Get rid of that camera bulge!

I think it's best for Apple to do major overhauls every 3 years instead of every 2 years as more people hang on to their phones longer.

Like something non-rectangular?

I think the only design advancements left are either bezel-less screen or foldable screen.

I've heard all-glass/transparent, I've heard flexible, I've heard OLED, I've heard curved, I've heard long-range wireless charging, and many others - a complete reboot of the cell phone, as they did with the original.

I think they need something like that. And the money the make/invest in R&D certainly wasn't reflected in the 7.

EDIT: Here's a decent summary of most of what I've heard.

OLED might let them reduce bezels but may reduce battery life.

One rumor would be that the Home button would integrate into the screen but not sure that's necessarily desirable.

I wouldn't say the 7 is minor over 6s, especially if the new SOC delivers 40% performance bump over the 6S.

Rumors had said they'd use the same design but that isn't the case. The camera bump is there but it's either the bump or a uniformly thicker device. With the OIS module, they probably can't avoid the bump without making the rest of the device thicker.

Also think the dual camera is the potential start of something big.

Not an iPhone guy, but this is a problem in many Android devices too. Personally I'd take a device a few mm thicker (and with a corresponding battery increase) over a thinner device. I don't get the push for ever-thinner phones. I'd rather have a beefier battery every time.

If iOS got an actual dark mode, OLED could very well improve battery life. It's why the Apple Watch has a dark UI for the most part.

I can vouch for this. With my Nexus 6, using an AMOLED Black theme significantly improves the battery life with the AMOLED screen.

But don't assume that if they added more space, they'd fill it with more battery, which costs more.

I know there were a couple of phones with really big battery capacity and I assume a more voluminous form factor.

I don't think they sold particularly well.

The consensus on the rumor mill is that the 2017 iPhone will break the #, #S cycle as it will be the 10-year anniversary of the first iPhone and that it will have a refreshed looked with many new features. MacRumors already has their iPhone 8 speculation page up: http://www.macrumors.com/roundup/iphone-8/

I think one of the best critiques of the iPhone 7 I have read so far was that it was more along the lines of an iPhone 6SS.

They may break that cycle, but I don't think Apple marketing people want to remind the youngsters about how old the iPhone is. They want to send the message that it is new and fresh. I doubt that they will play up the 10th anniversary at all. IMHO anyways.

Completely agree. The relentless pursuit of "thin" has almost become the same as the relentless pursuit of megapixels for the sake of megapixels in cameras.

Regards

The Iphone 7 already contains the major updates to the guts of the phone. The next one is refinements of the guts and major update of the exterior.

It is fairly obvious they are going OLED.

All glass body.

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess the finger sensor gets embedded on the back of the body.

I think there will be a super high priced version with ceramic body, with the glass as the base option.

Change in screen size as well. the 4.5 probably becomes 5", enabled by the move of the sensor to the back home button.

And it will of course be the "best ever".

Is it definite that next year's iPhone will be an all new design or just all assumption where we get another "s" next year?

Assumptions based on the fact that it will be the 10 year anniversary of the iPhone and Apple figures to do something special.