iPhone 17 Air release date: rumors, specs, and how thin it'll be
Apple is releasing its thinnest phone ever in 2025, and we've learned a lot about it ahead of its release date
📱 Apple is rumored to release the iPhone 17 Air later this year
🤏 The device will be Apple’s thinnest phone yet
🏎️ It’s rumored to have less powerful specs than the upcoming iPhone 17 Pro
⊕ It might wind up replacing the iPhone 17 Plus
🎓 Here’s what we know about the mysterious phone
Apple is shaking things up in 2025 with a brand-new iPhone.
That sentence might apply to any given year, but this year especially, it means something extra significant. The company is set to introduce an ultra-thin iPhone which many have dubbed the iPhone 17 Air. It’ll be Apple’s thinnest phone ever - even thinner than 2014’s iPhone 6 - and its primary goal will be grabbing the public’s attention with flashy hardware since software features like Apple Intelligence haven’t excited the public the way Apple hoped.
Hence, an ultra-thin iPhone with a weird list of specs is born. We anticipate this phone to come out later this year along with the rest of the successors to the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro. Here’s what we know about this oddball device that could wind up being a big deal (much bigger than the Galaxy S25 Edge seems destined for).
iPhone 17 Air rumored release date and price
📅 See you in September. We fully expect Apple to release the iPhone 17 Air in September alongside the regular iPhone 17, the iPhone 17 Pro, and the iPhone 17 Pro Max. There haven’t been any reports that have suggested otherwise, and the general consensus is Apple is waiting until after Labor Day to release it. So far this year, we’ve gotten the iPhone 16e which packs iPhone 16 specs into an iPhone 14 design, complete with an Action button and Apple Intelligence support.
💰 Probably less than a Pro. There have been conflicting reports about the price of the iPhone 17 Air. The Information said that the phone would start at $1,299, while The Wall Street Journal seems to think it’ll cost less than $1,000. Based on other rumors we’ve seen, I’d guess that the 17 Air will cost less than the iPhone 17 Pro since it’s supposed to succeed the iPhone 16 Plus, which starts at $899.
iPhone 17 Air design and rumored thinness
📐 The thinnest iPhone yet at 5.5mm. The iPhone 17 Air is rumored to be the thinnest iPhone that Apple has ever shipped. Famed industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo reported recently that the device will be just 5.5mm thin, which is noticeably thinner than Apple’s current thinnest phone, the 6.9mm iPhone 6. It’s slightly thicker than the 5.1mm M4 iPad Pro, which makes it one of Apple’s thinnest products of all time. This measurement lines up with previous rumors that suggested the device would be around 5-6mm thick and roughly 25% thinner than iPhone 16.
👀 Wait, is that a Pixel? As far as what the iPhone 17 Air will look like, it’s been a bit hard to guess since there’s been a lot of speculation. Some reports claim it’ll have centered cameras on the back, while others suggest a Google Pixel-like camera visor to fit the sensor and retain the slim form factor. Leaker Maijin Bu, who correctly predicted the “Desert Titanium” iPhone 16 Pro color, shared images of what they claim to be the 17 Air, while FrontPageTech also shared renders that include a huge camera bump. Maybe that’s what it’ll look like?
📱 A big screen with ProMotion. The iPhone 17 Air is expected to come with a 6.6-inch OLED display, which is a tenth of an inch smaller than the iPhone 16 Plus. Where the biggest change comes into play is the refresh rate. Apple is expected to expand 120Hz ProMotion to the regular iPhone 17 and 17 Air this year after keeping it exclusive to Pro phones since 2021. That means everything you do on your phone - whether it’s scrolling through social media, opening apps, or dragging and dropping files - will look a whole lot smoother.
📸 Only one camera and one speaker. The iPhone 17 Air is only expected to come with one camera on the back due to its form factor. Apple will reportedly include a 48MP sensor on the back with a 24MP selfie camera on the front. In addition, there might only be one speaker on the phone: the earpiece. This doesn’t sound great for those who need beefy cameras and speakers on their phones, but I suppose thinness is the name of the game here, and Apple seems to want to do whatever it takes.
📶 No SIM slot… anywhere. Another compromise the iPhone 17 Air will make to retain its thin form factor is the SIM card slot. While Apple hasn’t offered one on the iPhone in the United States in a couple years, in other markets, you can still get a physical slot and not have to rely on eSIM. That’ll change with the 17 Air, which isn’t expected to come with one in any international market. That could pose a problem in China where physical SIMs are the law of the land for smartphones.
iPhone 17 Air rumored specs
🏎️ The same chip as iPhone 17. Since the iPhone 17 Air isn’t technically a Pro phone, we expect Apple to include the rumored A19 processor in it like the regular iPhone 17. Meanwhile, the iPhone 17 Pro will get the rumored A19 Pro processor.
🔋 A small-ish battery is likely… With a thinner phone comes thinner components, and we’ve been hearing that the iPhone 17 Air will include a smaller battery than what we have now. How much smaller is anyone’s guess, but it’ll shrink nonetheless after Apple failed to incorporate new materials into the battery to make it more compact. The battery is likely to be somewhere between 3,000mAh and 4,000mAh.
👀 … but battery life might not suck. Despite the small size, the battery in the iPhone 17 Air might not be terrible. Apple’s new C1 5G modem, which debuted in the iPhone 16e, comes with 25% improved efficiency over other modems that Apple has used in the past. C1 is expected to come to the entire iPhone 17 lineup, which means the 17 Air might actually manage to last a full day.
🛜 Apple’s in-house Wi-Fi chip. The iPhone 17 Air will reportedly serve as a testing ground for Apple’s next in-house chip, which combines Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth into a 3-nanometer form factor. The rest of the iPhone 17 series could also adopt the chip, but it seems most likely to land in the 17 Air since three separate chips would take up a lot of space. It’ll also aid in efficiency like the C1, but it’s unclear how big an impact it’ll have.
🤖 Apple Intelligence ready. The iPhone 17 Air will, of course, be fully compatible with Apple Intelligence. Apple is expected to include 8GB of RAM on the device which is enough to handle all of the AI features that Apple has rolled out thus far. The device will be powered by iOS 19 which is expected to be announced this June during WWDC.
iPhone 17 Air coverage continues
We’ll be keeping our eyes on iPhone 17 Air rumors until it’s announced later this year. We’ll also be updating this guide with new rumors as they roll in, so be sure to bookmark it and subscribe to The Shortcut so you don’t miss anything.
Max Buondonno is an editor at The Shortcut. He’s been reporting on the latest consumer technology since 2015, with his work featured on CNN Underscored, ZDNET, How-To Geek, XDA, TheStreet, and more. Follow him on X @LegendaryScoop and Instagram @LegendaryScoop.