It's been a week since Apple released the iPhone 16e, its new low-cost (but not as low-cost as before) smartphone. The iPhone 16e has many of the same capabilities as Apple's flagship iPhones, but it is lacking in some key areas to save money. So, is it worth the savings? MacRumors videographer Dan Barbera spent a week with the iPhone 16e as his main iPhone to see what he could live without.
At $599, the iPhone 16e is quite a bit more expensive than the iPhone SE 3 that it replaces, but it offers a current-generation A18 chip, an all-display design with Face ID instead of Touch ID and OLED technology, a 48-megapixel single-lens rear camera, long battery life, USB-C, and safety features like Emergency SOS via Satellite and Crash Detection, all of which were not in the iPhone SE.
Most iPhones have had two or more cameras for several years now, so the single-lens camera on the iPhone 16e is surprisingly subtle and makes for a clean, minimal design where the camera isn't the dominant feature drawing the eye. There's also less weight with the slimmed down camera setup, so it doesn't feel heavy in the hand. You can only get the iPhone 16e in black or white, but they're classic colors.
Since Apple slimmed down the bezels with the flagship iPhone 16 lineup, the bezels on the iPhone 16e are more noticeable, but that's something that will mostly only come up when it's right next to an iPhone 16. Apple modeled the iPhone 16e after the iPhone 14, so it's also got a notch instead of a Dynamic Island. The OLED display doesn't support 120Hz, and it's not quite as bright as what you get with the iPhone 16. You're also not going to get the always-on display, and if that's something you're used to, you might miss it. But if you've never had that functionality, you won't know the difference.
There's no Camera Control button, but you do get an Action Button and support for all of the Apple Intelligence features, including Visual Intelligence. It's just activated from the Control Center or Action Button instead of Camera Control. The Camera Control button isn't something most people will likely care about. The A18 chip is basically the same chip you get in the iPhone 16, but with one less GPU core, a change that's not super noticeable.
Apple added a USB-C port for charging, but one major absence is support for MagSafe and Qi2. There is no magnetic ring in the iPhone 16e, so it does not work with all of the magnetic accessories that have come out for iPhones over the last several years. It's also limited to 7.5W charging speeds instead of the 15W you can get with MagSafe or Qi2, and that's a big downside.
If you've never had MagSafe, you won't mind charging primarily with a cable, but if you have MagSafe accessories already, it's going to be a downgrade.
The 48-megapixel camera is about the same as the camera in the iPhone 16, and it can take 1x and 2x photos. You don't get a Telephoto lens with 5x zoom or an Ultra Wide lens with 0.5x zoom and macro photo capabilities, but those are more niche camera features that are more nice to have than essential.
The iPhone 16e has one unique component, and that's Apple's C1 modem. So far, it seems to be performing about the same as Qualcomm's modem chip, though there is no support for the faster mmWave 5G networks. We didn't see any notable speed difference between the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16e when testing the devices on Verizon's network, but the C1 modem actually seemed to be more reliable in some instances where signal was low.
Did you get an iPhone 16e? Let us know what you think of it in the comments.