The price looks too close to the iPhone 16, and could be a misstep when you consider the phone is aimed at the growing number of people who's priority is price, not features.
Smart move by Apple to charge customers $599 to perform field validation testing of their first generation cellular modem! Of course it will be launching in all those additional languages in April because they need to test the new modem in as many markets with as many carriers as possible before the iPhone 17 launch in September. I’m not being cynical about this, I think it is an excellent strategy; switching to an in-house mode is a very big risk.
EDIT: Here in Canada it starts at $899. Nope, it’s not worth it. The base 16, that is significantly better is not that much more.
If you are thinking of buying a 16 in Canada, be sure to make that decision soon. The only reason the price difference between the 16E and 16 is at $230 CAD is because Apple hasn't updated the exchange rate on the 16.
The 16e is using an ~1.5 USD to CAD exchange.
16 is currently ~1.4. An adjustment will bump it up another $75 to a $305 difference.
I expect we'll see the equivalent high exchange rate on anything else that comes out this spring, and at some point they'll update other items in the store if the CAD dollar continues to shift around $1.45.
The last SE was $429. Now it's $599. That's a $259 increase!
Keep in mind that the dramatic increase in price was not because shortage due to pandemic but as a result of tariffs imposed by our President Trump. People voted for Trump who slapped tariffs on our imports and the costs are being passed to us.
Stop calling it "a new low price point" - it's NOT. It's "increased due to tariffs."
I think the price conscious would choose a lower price vs FaceID and AI.
And also, for your average use, AI really is a junk feature.
Whatever Apple say I feel like I am being used as a free trainer for their AI
I'm sure there are some folks who would prefer to use the telegraph if given the option, but the technology is advancing and this is in service of bringing their products all to the same, current feature sets. Maintaining touchID on one random product means continuing to have to support that feature in future software updates as well as continue sourcing components in small quantities for one product line, which will actually make them more expensive over time than sharing components in larger volume across all devices.
The price looks too close to the iPhone 16, and could be a misstep when you consider the phone is aimed at the growing number of people who's priority is price, not features.
It's a $200 difference between the 16 and 16e, which makes for an easy decision for a customer whose priority is price, not features.
If you're referring instead to the 16e coming in higher as compared to cheaper Android models, Apple has never been interested in chasing that one. High volume, low- (or no-) profit phones are of no value to Apple. Apple is a hardware company, and the rest of their famous ecosystem is about driving sales of profitable Apple devices. The other companies work from the opposite direction. Hardware, software and ecosystem are all about herding people into the user abattoir, so their data can be harvested and served up in an open-wallet consumer stew to those companies' real customers.
The last SE was $429. Now it's $599. That's a $170 increase! (edited to correct math)
Keep in mind that the dramatic increase in price was not because shortage due to pandemic but as a result of tariffs imposed by our President Trump. People voted for Trump who slapped tariffs on our imports and the costs are being passed to us.
Stop calling it "a new low price point" - it's NOT. It's "increased due to tariffs."
Hey... there's plenty of blame to go around for the Felon & fElon Circus, but the price of the 16e has got nothing to do with it. No new tariffs have been imposed--yet--that would affect the 16e. Also note that the 16e is being made in India, not China.
iPhone 12 Mini still blows 16e to pieces and you can get New ex-stock 100% battery on eBay for HALF the price of this.
Apple Intelligence is so far, a joke, and why would you even want it when the Gemini app with 2.0 or Perplexity app, or ANY of the other AI LLM’s are so much more capable currently, now and well into the future imho. Apple are NOWHERE with their AI and Siri is a decade old and still useless.
The big Price bump is purely to reposition it for higher profit, on the back of said useless Apple Intelligence.
Loses one camera and MagSafe magnets and is only 3.4 grams (0.12 oz) lighter. If Apple won’t make an iPhone mini, least they can do is make the 16e a whole lot lighter.
I feel for those poor iPhone 15 users. They got bent over and shafted with the deliberately nerfed RAM in their iPhones so that it wouldn’t be a competitor to this iPhone 16e.
Has anyone determined which country this phone is "Assembled In"? It will impact my purchase decision. The previous SE's were "Assembled in India" I think.
So this was a $170 jump from the SE, and many people are commenting how that kind of bunches up the pricing structure. My big fear is that Apple will bump the 17 line up by a comparable amount this fall.
Just... wow. I'm kind of stunned. The phone, itself, is pretty much as expected. But that price point... YIKES. So the cheapest iPhone is now 40% more expensive than it was yesterday. Although, in an apples to apples comparison -- price of SE 3 128 vs 16E base model 128 -- it's a 25% hike. I'm not saying the 16E isn't worth it, fhe list of improvements over the SE is huge, but raising the price of entry into the iPhone ecosystem by 40% is a giant cojones pricing move. I'm certainly not going to question the decision, since I'm sure it was made with a ton of data supporting that this would work out okay, but I never saw this coming.
No surprise and I will also not be a surprised with most people buying the even higher priced iPhone’s above it, over the years the marketshare enthusiasts have always said without fail, Apple should offer a cheaper device (for marketshare) but every time they do most people elect to buy the more expensive models this time will be no different.
The reason being is simple. Every time Apple placed a so-called cheap product to buy in the iPhone or iPad models. It is always at a price that's not very reasonable when compared to the other models. They keep pricing it so close to the next model that many just pony up buy that model. Only the people who really want to buy the very cheapest model offered buy it. Most others who understand specs vs cost will most likely buy the models that are a bit more expensive because they are too close the base (cheap) model in price to justify in buying.
This is where Apple is hardheaded at. You want to offer a low budget device then it needs to be low budget priced. If it's too close in price to the next model in the lineup then chances are people are going to ignore it.
I'm still using my 11 Pro Max 64GB iPhone, 16GB iPad Mini3 and late 2015 27" iMac. Cook isn't going to see a cent (yen coin) from me until prices in Japan are reasonable again.
Comments
16 is currently ~1.4. An adjustment will bump it up another $75 to a $305 difference.
And also, for your average use, AI really is a junk feature.
Whatever Apple say I feel like I am being used as a free trainer for their AI
If you're referring instead to the 16e coming in higher as compared to cheaper Android models, Apple has never been interested in chasing that one. High volume, low- (or no-) profit phones are of no value to Apple. Apple is a hardware company, and the rest of their famous ecosystem is about driving sales of profitable Apple devices. The other companies work from the opposite direction. Hardware, software and ecosystem are all about herding people into the user abattoir, so their data can be harvested and served up in an open-wallet consumer stew to those companies' real customers.
Apple Intelligence is so far, a joke, and why would you even want it when the Gemini app with 2.0 or Perplexity app, or ANY of the other AI LLM’s are so much more capable currently, now and well into the future imho. Apple are NOWHERE with their AI and Siri is a decade old and still useless.
The big Price bump is purely to reposition it for higher profit, on the back of said useless Apple Intelligence.
599.00 for this without MagSafe?
Its the new pricing as everything is going to shoot up now hundreds of dollars
If Apple won’t make an iPhone mini, least they can do is make the 16e a whole lot lighter.