Why Apple probably didn’t have to update iPhone 16E every year

Apple is quite secret about the sales numbers of individual products, so we need to satisfy income figures for entire categories. But even with these vague figures, most analysts agree that this year’s iPhone 16E is changing significantly more devices than the 3rd Gen iPhone SE (kind) replaced.

In the latest edition of his power on newsletter, which largely followed Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman, says this is not surprising.

“For fans of SE,” he explains, “the leap from the second generation to the third was quite minimal [that’s a polite way to put it]So there was less reason to upgrade. IPhone 16e-Mens It basically is a demolished iPhone 16-is a meaningful redesign from SE 3. ”

Gurman adds that Apple marketed 16E in a smarter and more appealing way than the 2022 wit of SE. By tying it in with the Premium 16-Series phones rather than the budget SE-Line, the company added “quite a little more lure” to markets like China.

That’s all good news for Apple, but Gurman says he’s more interested in another question: Whether Apple will update the “E” line of iPhones once a year, as it does with the flagship handsets. The SE line, on the other hand, was updated quite sporadic: These phones arrived in 2016, 2020 and 2022, before 16E debuted in 2025.

Gurman does not claim to be sure if “E” iPhones will follow an annual launch cadence as he says Apple himself has not made a final decision. But he points out that competing companies such as Samsung and Google release new budget phones one or more times a year, and concludes on this basis that an annual upgrade cycle for the iPhone 16E and its successors “makes a lot of sense.”

But I’m not convinced it does. At Gurman’s own logic, the iPhone 16e received a positive reception specifically because it represented a significant upgrade on and a major change from 3rd-se-see, a device that costs far less and came out three years earlier. It would definitely not be the case if Apple launched an iPhone 17E in April 2026, and based it on what appears to be a cautious set of 17-series handsets in September. The phone is likely to be very similar to 16E, and while it may appeal to the owners of the iPhone 13 or 14, it would not represent the exciting marine change that won the 16E such apparent commercial success.

The problem is that you can start regularly or you can release phones that are a big improvement of their predecessors but you can’t do both. Or rather, you may not like it, but Apple does not like it because regular material updates cut into profit margins and make future launches more difficult to navigate.

In balance, I think it probably makes sense to separate a predictable annual launch cadence for the “E” line so that customers can learn to expect a new middle market phone every spring and adjust their shopping plans accordingly. But this would not guarantee a smash hit every year like the rest of the iPhone line. When I make the decision, Apple will be sure to be in the likelihood that a 17E in April 2026 would be much less interesting to customers than 16E was in April.

But here is one last point. Apple could Make the 17E instantly appealing by turning some of the more extreme compromises it has done to ensure that 16E supported Apple Intelligence. To achieve this, 16E was equipped with an A18 chip and 8GB of RAM, a far more powerful (and expensive) setup than it otherwise needed. But now that the bar has been cleared, these primary specifications need not change in 2026. Apple could release a 17E with the same chip, the same RAM and focus its resources on restoring Magsafe, maybe. Or add another camera lens. Or even switch from a notch to the dynamic island.

These changes if they are logistically feasible would ensure another successful “E” launch. But this strategy has a limited shelf life because 18E has to improve to. And in the end, it means switching to a long -term annual release strategy to accept that a great deal of your products with a gap will be received, not a cry.