Everything Apple could announce at the September Event

This year will definitely be a big year.

It's that time of year again – new iPhone season. Every September, Apple holds the coveted September event where they typically announce the next iPhone or iPhones. Expectations have been sky-high, since the rumors that have been swirling have been quite groundbreaking. Here is what is coming at the next Apple event.

While there is one wildcard that may or may not arrive at this event, there are a handful of products that will almost certainly be announced at this event. There is one obvious one: the iPhone 17 lineup. As in past years, the iPhone 17 will be a lineup of phones, this year, changing a model.

The iPhone 17 lineup will consist of 4 models this year, the same as last year. There will be the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Air, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max.

The noticeable change in the lineup is that there is no 'Plus' model this time around. Instead, Apple is replacing the Plus model withe iPhone 17 Air. This iPhone will be the thinnest model yet, coming in at 5.5mm. It won't be the company's thinnest ever device; that would have to go to the M4 iPad Pro, coming in at an astonishing 5.1 mm (for the 13-inch model). 5.5mm is still shockingly thin, which means that this particular iPhone will only have one camera.

The issue with adding more cameras to an ultra-thin device like that is that it requires a lot of depth and space inside the phone to accommodate for the light being captured, in a literal sense. There needs to be more physical space to have more than one camera, which starts to show my thoughts about this device.

The whole issue with the MacBooks in recent years (up until Apple Silicon) is that function, in a lot of cases, has to go over form. The thinness of the old MacBooks was something that compromised other areas like the keyboard, which the iPhone doesn't have, or the performance, which isn't a worry on the iPhone.

The reason it isn't a worry is because iPhones use incredibly cool (in temperature) and efficient chips that are similar to the Apple Silicon MacBooks, which have proven to have good performance in those same thin designs.

My worry with the thin iPhone is battery life. While, yes, the thin old MacBooks had okay battery life, that is because the space for battery wasn't as impacted because shaving off a few millimeters is literally less percent of the space than a few millimeters is on a phone. Each extra millimeter taken off from already thin iPhones has an immense impact on battery life.

Maybe Apple will have some software magic to make up for this (which wouldn't surprise me). However, it makes me sad to see Apple regress into this old notion of form over function and going too far.

Enough about the iPhone 17 Air though. The rest of the iPhones will have a new-ish design with a camera bar, but the camera layout will still be the same. The metal from the sides will extend onto the back except for a rectangle in the middle of the back of the device, which will be glass. This will probably be for wireless charging and other MagSafe devices.

It is also rumored that Apple will be using this space for reverse wireless charging. This enables users to charge their other devices by placing them on the back of the iPhone 17. This is a feature that has been on Android devices for years and many people (myself included) are very happy to see it come to Apple devices.

Along with the new iPhones, Apple is expected to announce a refresh to the entire lineup of Apple Watches. The Apple Watch Ultra and SE will both be getting refreshes alongside the Apple Watch Series 11.

There is a possible announcement of new AirPods Pro (3rd generation) at this event. There hasn't been much in the way of leaks about these AirPods, other than an IR camera built in. This has been suggested to possibly push the launch back to 2026, but no one can be sure.

The last wildcard that could be announced at this event is the smart home hub that has been rumored for years now. Rumors suggested that the hub would be ready for launch around March of this past year, but then it got delayed in production for a few more months. We could be seeing it at this event, but I wouldn't hold my breath, since we haven't heard much about it in months.

The September Apple Event looks to be a good one, with lots of exciting announcements. We will have to see what Apple does soon.