*Here's my quick, not at all comprehensive, and hardly helpful or informative recap of the Awe Dropping Apple Event.*

A tight 75-minute Apple Event ends with the release of AirPods 3, updates across the Apple Watch Lineup, a new iPhone 17, an all-new iPhone Air, and a couple of vapour-chamber cooled iPhone 17 Pro models.

Update 01: Published 15:05 on 2025.09.09. I need to walk the dog (because she’s annoying me and I’m not a real writer/journalist so this doesn’t really have any real urgency to be published), but I will continue to update this page over the next couple days with additional thoughts, reflections, and screenshots.

Good Morning

The introductory video, which began with a quote from Steve and highlighted Apple's dedication to design, was interesting. Apple really focused on highlighting how its OS and hardware designs have always been carefully crafted. Maybe I'm too entrenched in the tech ecosystem circles, but some (and perhaps me a little) have been somewhat critical of Apple's recent design designs, notably Liquid Glass. Is this a subtle rebuke towards some of that?

I loved how Apple highlighted their retail stores from around the world, including stores in Singapore, the UAE, China, & Turkey. Unlike previous Apple events where presenters hung close to Cupertino/California, this time presenters were scattered in retail stores across the US, including Chicago, Miami, and New York.

AirPods Pro 3

AirPods Pro are the best listening devices I own. They're portable, comfortable, offer incredible sound cancellation, and include some vital hearing health features. Now the AirPods Pro 3 get all that PLUS heart-rate monitoring, Live Translation (although that's also coming to AirPods 4 (with Noise Cancellation) and AirPods Pro 2), better IP57 dust, sweat and water resistance, better noise cancellation, better fit, AND better battery life. S-Tier product for sure.
I’m pleased Apple didn't gate-keep Live Translation to this model and extended it to older versions of AirPods (AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods 4 w. Noise Cancellation).
Excited to try out the Live Translation at some point. It is currently limited to only a few languages (English (UK, U.S.), French (France), German, Portuguese (Brazil), and Spanish (Spain)), but this should expand over time.
I felt the overall pitch was a bit pushy, though, describing these as a "Must have upgrade..." I can't recall a time when Apple used such verbiage in introducing its products.

Apple Watch

I have no idea why a watch needs 5G, but whatever. At least it doesn't negatively impact battery life. In fact, Apple stated that battery Life now extends from 18-to-24 hours.
Hypertension monitoring is a notable addition to the watch, although the feature wasn't showcased in great depth. Looks like Apple is obtaining clearances. Like sleep apnea or temperature monitoring, this isn't an exact or on-demand measurement of blood pressure. Still, it will monitor trends and alert you if it detects higher levels or elevations over time.
I love the Sleep Score feature! Available for the Series 6 or newer, this provides a much more digestible way of presenting sleep data for users.
Seriously, they brought back Space Grey (Series 11 Apple Watch). I thought we were done with Space Grey...
No new band styles were introduced to the Apple Watch Lineup (excluding a few Hermes variations), but we did get a range of new colours and some reflective threading on the Nike Sport Loop & Ultra Trail Loop.

SE

Meaningful update to the SE 3. It still features the smaller 40/44mm casing and 1000 nits display, but now includes an Always-On display, 5G, Crash Detection, and the S10 Chip that supports on-device Siri, Double tap, and Wrist flick, as well as fast charging.

Ultra

The Ultra update is subtle, but nice. Slightly slimmer borders give the Ultra the largest display of any Apple Watch, hypertension notifications, Emergency SOS via Satellite, 5G, and significantly improved battery life (from 36 up to 42 hours).
Recommendation: Nice enough update coming from the original Ultra or an older Apple Watch, but unless you really want Hypertension or Satellite, the other features are nice but pretty minor if you already own a Ultra 2.

iPhone 17

As expected, the iPhone Plus is no more, but the main iPhone did get slightly bigger, moving from a 6.1-inch to a 6.3-inch display.
Nice of Apple to add Always-On and ProMotion (only took 18 years) to the mainline iPhone.

*Lavender, Mist Blue, Black, White, & Sage*

With the iPhone 15, Apple shunned colour; with the iPhone 16, they turned the dial up to 11, and this year, with the 17, they struck a balance right in the middle. Nothing will ever top that Ultramarine colourway though.

That's quite an improvement in Battery Life from the 16th to the 17th: up 8 hours from 22 to 30. However, these are video playback tests that utilize the most optimized codecs, so it remains to be seen what your real-life gains will be when performing your everyday tasks.
I love the larger, 18MP square sensor for the front camera, which allows you to take photos and then decide whether you want the image to be in landscape or portrait orientation.
Am I the only person who got completely scrambled listening to them describe the camera systems on each phone? It's one camera, but it's equivalent to four cameras due to this technology, or these three cameras are comparable to eight cameras... my brain stopped working at some point.
Apple says iPhone users snapped 500,000,000,000 selfies last year. With roughly 1.56 billion active iPhones in use, this translates to more than 320 selfies per user annually. Now, as someone who has taken 0-3 selfies per year, that means that there are people out there taking thousands of selfies to complete that average.
Dual Capture is a useful feature, allowing you to record from both the front and rear cameras simultaneously. Sucks that this feature is being gatekept to the 17 lineup since other camera apps on iPhone have been able to offer this functionality. This is a pure software lock.

iPhone Air

“The Iconic Plateau”, so that's the official Apple vernacular for what we should be calling the camera bump.
They really pushed the durability angle of the iPhone Air - it felt like I was watching the infamous 5G Apple Event again.
Really impressed by what Apple is doing with the Modems. The C1X, an update to the C1 modem introduced with the iPhone 16e, is reportedly faster than the 5G modem inside the 16 Pro (shots fired, Qualcomm) and 30% more power-efficient. Can't wait till this spreads across the rest of Apple's lineup.

*Holy Smokes! The ENTIRE iPhone Air is inside the Camera Plateau. Camera, brains, chips, all of it. This thing is basically 95% battery.*

YAY! The MagSafe Battery pack is back! Boo... it's exclusive to the iPhone Air.

YAY! The iPhone Bumper Case is back! Boo... it's exclusive to the iPhone Air.

iPhone 17 Pro

Interesting that Apple opted to leave out a Space Black variation this time around, leaving only three colours (Silver, Cosmic Orange, and Deep Blue). I always thought the black models were preferred over coloured or silver variations, so it felt like an odd choice to leave out a dark-neutral option.
The Vapour Chamber is a great idea. My Pro Max does get quite toasty at times, and given how this phone is geared towards professional video and photography, an advanced cooling system is a welcome addition.

*The durability testing of the new iPhones was absolute cinema!*

Disappointed by the move towards aluminium. Yes, I know it's lighter and has better heat dissipation, but I really loved the feel of both Stainless Steel and Titanium.
Apple's push towards eSIM continues, and for the first time, this comes with a significant incentive: an additional 2 hours of battery life.

Other

Apple also updated the page with a new 40W Dynamic Power Adapter with 60W Max, updated FineWoven MagSafe Wallet Colours (Fox Orange, Midnight Purple, Navy, Moss, Black) and a collection of new cases from Beats, including an iPhone 17 Pro & Pro Max Kickstand Case & a Beats iPhone 17 Pro & Pro Max Rugged Case.

Awe Dropping Recap