Are These This Year’s iPhone 16 Colors?
Credit: Sonny Dickson / X
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Although we’ve been hearing rumors since February on what to expect from Apple’s iPhone 16 Pro color palette, leakers have been much quieter on predictions for the standard iPhone 16 models.
That’s a bit surprising since while the Pro colors can be slightly more nuanced, the standard colors are (almost) always bright, fun, and varied. Last year’s iPhone 15 lineup may have been a bit of a departure, with more muted pastels — the blue iPhone 15 borders on white — but if a new leak is accurate, we could see a return to more saturated hues that might bring an even more unusual twist.
Leaker Sonny Dickson, who shared some iPhone 16 molds earlier this year, has now provided some pictures purporting to show the entire color range of the iPhone 16 lineup based on similar dummy units that have now been colored in.
The colors shown are white, black, blue, green, and pink, although it’s unclear if Apple will use these names. Apple abandoned “Midnight” and “Starlight” with last year’s iPhone 15, and the shades in the photo look more like pure black and white. The colors also match the names in other reports we’ve heard from analysts such as Ming-Chi Kuo, although this is the first time we’ve seen them.
However, what’s particularly noteworthy is that the blue and green are among the darkest shades we’ve ever seen on non-pro models. While the iPhone 13 lineup leaned in that direction, especially after the mid-cycle green was added to the deeper blue, it still had a pink in the lineup that was quite bright and lively.
The iPhone 12 also had a darker blue to correspond to the Pacific Blue iPhone 12 Pro, but that was offset by a very pastel green and a vibrant purple. The iPhone XR, iPhone 11, and iPhone 14 lineups consisted entirely of brighter colors (with the obvious exception of black, which arguably isn’t a color).
If this leak is accurate, the entire lineup will have more muted colors. There’s also no evidence of a (PRODUCT)RED edition, although the photo may not include the full color lineup. A (PRODUCT)RED edition was conspicuously missing from the iPhone 15 lineup last year. However, this may have been due to Apple’s new color infusion process being unable to produce a deep enough shade of red.
Apple has traditionally offered six colorways for its standard iPhone models, although in 2020, it began releasing only five colors in the fall and holding one back for a later spring release (the purple iPhone 12, the green iPhone 13, and the yellow iPhone 14). Last year’s iPhone 15 lineup was the first to come in only five colors, with an anticipated sixth failing to materialize.
Dickson’s previous leak showed only silver models, although it confirmed the new camera arrangement we’ve been hearing about since last fall, reorienting the lenses back into a tandem arrangement that was the norm before Apple switched them to a diagonal placement in the iPhone 13. While the reason for the layout change isn’t any clearer than the last one was, one theory is that Apple is doing it to make way for Spatial Video Capture on the standard iPhone models.
However, the iPhone 16 camera design hearkens back to the era of the iPhone XS, before Apple adopted a more squarish camera bump that incorporated the flash and mirrored its triple-lens pro models. With the iPhone 16, it appears Apple will go back to a pill-shaped camera bump in the style of the iPhone X and iPhone XS, but with the flash off to the side rather than centered between the lenses as it was on those older models.
[The information provided in this article has NOT been confirmed by Apple and may be speculation. Provided details may not be factual. Take all rumors, tech or otherwise, with a grain of salt.]
