iDevice review
iPhone 18 Pro review: cooler, faster and good for a day and a half
It runs cooler and the battery goes longer, in a phone that otherwise plays it safe.
Thumbs up
- Runs much cooler under load
- About a day and a half per charge
- 50% in about 15 minutes
- Bright, accurate 120Hz screen
- Three 48MP rear cameras
Thumbs down
- Small sustained-speed gain over the 17 Pro
- Variable aperture effect is modest
Play a demanding game on the iPhone 18 Pro for half an hour and the phone stays comfortable in your hands. That's the change you'll feel first. Under sustained load it doesn't build up much heat, so performance holds without the phone getting uncomfortable.
The second change shows up at night. Where a typical owner got one full day before, the 18 Pro easily stretches to a day and a half. On heavy days out and about, it can still end with 40% left.
Battery
Apple rates the 18 Pro at up to 36 hours of video playback. In real life, most owners get well past a full day before they plug in. When you do charge, a 60W adapter gets you to 50% in about 15 minutes, and MagSafe and Qi2 both go up to 25W.
Speed
The A20 Pro chip is faster across the CPU, graphics and Neural Engine. Long gaming sessions are steadier too, though under a stress test the gain over the 17 Pro is small, about 1.7%. What you'll notice is the lack of heat, not the benchmark.
Screen
The 6.3-inch OLED is bright and color-accurate, with ProMotion up to 120Hz and an always-on mode. Peak brightness is about the same as the 17 Pro's, so outdoor visibility didn't change. That's fine, because it was already very good.
Cameras
All three rear cameras are 48MP: a main with variable aperture, a 13mm ultrawide and a 4x telephoto at 100mm. The variable aperture gives photographers more control, but in practice the effect is modest, and the manual controls matter more. Video goes up to 4K Dolby Vision at 120 frames per second on the main camera, with ProRes RAW and Apple Log 2 for people who edit seriously. The front camera is 18MP.
Build
It's 211 grams (7.44 oz) in an aluminum unibody, with Ceramic Shield 2 on the front. It's IP68 to 6 meters (about 20 feet) for 30 minutes, and you get Face ID, the Action button and Camera Control. Colors are black, silver, glacier and burgundy.