Apple iPhone 16 Pro review

GSMArena Team, 03 October 2024.

Apple iOS 18

Apple iPhone 16, 16 Plus, 16 Pro and 16 Pro Max come with the latest available Apple iOS 18 pre-installed. While Apple tried to present this new iteration as one of the biggest redesigns, it doesn't feel that big in day-to-day use. However, allowing for deep personalization options across the homescreens and interface does have the potential to make the UI rather unique and different, something which has been lacking on iOS through the years.

All iPhones will get at least five years of iOS updates, which has been an Apple thing for years.

You can check out our iOS 18 feature walkthrough for a deeper dive in what's new in this generation of the iPhone OS.

Connectivity

The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max come with a variety of network connectivity options depending on your region. In certain countries, Apple also offers satellite connectivity on the iPhone 16 models for emergency pings outside of cell range and Roadside Assistance via satellite (subscription required).

Apple iPhone 16 Pro review

Emergency SOS and Find My via satellite do still have some regional limitations, too.

For local connectivity, the iPhone 16 Pro has dual-band Wi-Fi 7 as well as Bluetooth 5.3 with LE support. There is NFC on board for things like Apple Pay and Name Drop contact sharing. It also has a second-generation Apple Ultrawideband (UWB) chip. It enables precise Find My with directional arrows and has up to three times increased range compared to the original Apple U1 chip. You can also use precision finding in a crowd with Find My Friends. We should note that the UWB chip and its functionality are not available in every market and are disabled in some countries due to regulatory issues.

The USB-C port on the iPhone 16 Pro models adheres to the USB 3.2 standard and supports up to 10Gbps transfer speeds - compare that to the USB 2.0-compliant vanilla iPhone 16s and their 480Mbps data transfer cap.

Video output is supported as well (Display port DP) via Type-C Alt mode, which means that most standard Type-C hubs with a video interface should be able to get an image from the phone. By default, you get a mirror of the display without any other fancy options like a dedicated desktop mode or anything of the sort. In other words, it does a simple screen mirror for the UI.

All iPhone 16 models also support USB Host mode, and we successfully hooked up a mouse and keyboard. The keyboard started working instantly but getting the mouse to pick up and actually show an on-screen cursor required enabling the Assistive Touch option in Settings. USB thumb drives, card readers, and hard drives work fine and automatically mount and appear in the Files app. Compatible external storage is also recognized by the Camera app, and you can output ProRes videos there.

Various USB-C game controller/phone holders are supported, too. Anything that works on Android via USB-C should work on the new iPhones as hassle-free.

Performance, benchmarks, stress tests

The Apple iPhone 16 Pro and 16 Pro Max employ the most powerful Apple silicon in a phone to this day - the Apple A18 Pro. It has a six-core CPU, six-core GPU and 8GB RAM.

Apple promises up to 20% better sustained performance on these phones compared to their predecessors thanks to improvements in heat dissipation and efficiency. The A18 Pro is built on a 3nm process and has a new 16-core Neural Engine. There's a 17% increase in total system memory bandwidth, which also benefits the 6-core GPU which is up to 20% faster than the previous generation.

The improved new 6-core CPU has two high performance cores clocked at 4.04GHz and four efficient cores working at 2.2GHz. Apple says this processor is "the fastest in a smartphone", and that its cores can run the same workload as the iPhone 15 Pro 15% faster while using 20% less power.

The Apple A18 Pro has a faster GPU than the A18 inside the iPhone 16 but appears to feature the same processor.

Apple iPhone 16 Pro review

We have decided to add some of the most recent Android flagships for comparison, even if the cross-platform benchmarks should always be taken with a significant dose of skepticism.

The new Apple A18 Pro CPU inside the iPhone 16 Pro does score about 15% more than the A17 Pro inside the iPhone 15 Pro.

There is also between 15% and 20% jump in GPU performance depending on the 3D test.

GeekBench 6

  • Multi-core
  • Single-core
iPhone 16 Pro Max iPhone 16 Pro Max
8606
Apple A18 Pro 512GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 16 Pro iPhone 16 Pro
8283
Apple A18 Pro 256GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 16 iPhone 16
7929
Apple A18 128GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 16 Plus iPhone 16 Plus
7927
Apple A18 128GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 15 Pro iPhone 15 Pro
7172
Apple A17 Pro 256GB, 8GB RAM
Zenfone 11 Ultra Zenfone 11 Ultra
7085
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 512GB, 16GB RAM
Galaxy S24 Ultra Galaxy S24 Ultra
7076
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SM8650-AC 512GB, 12GB RAM
Xiaomi 14 Ultra Xiaomi 14 Ultra
7060
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 512GB, 16GB RAM
vivo X100 Ultra vivo X100 Ultra
6586
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 1TB, 16GB RAM
iPhone 14 Pro iPhone 14 Pro
6556
Apple A16 Bionic 256GB, 6GB RAM
Oppo Find X7 Ultra Oppo Find X7 Ultra
6472
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 512GB, 16GB RAM
Sony Xperia 1 VI Sony Xperia 1 VI
6119
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 256GB. 12GB RAM
Pixel 9 Pro Pixel 9 Pro
4728
Google Tensor G4 128GB, 16GB RAM
Huawei Pura 70 Ultra Huawei Pura 70 Ultra
4482
Kirin 9010 1TB, 16GB RAM
iPhone 16 Pro Max iPhone 16 Pro Max
3490
Apple A18 Pro 512GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 16 Pro iPhone 16 Pro
3370
Apple A18 Pro 256GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 16 Plus iPhone 16 Plus
3274
Apple A18 128GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 16 iPhone 16
3263
Apple A18 128GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 15 Pro iPhone 15 Pro
2922
Apple A17 Pro 256GB, 8GB RAM
iPhone 14 Pro iPhone 14 Pro
2567
Apple A16 Bionic 256GB, 6GB RAM
Xiaomi 14 Ultra Xiaomi 14 Ultra
2297
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 512GB, 16GB RAM
Galaxy S24 Ultra Galaxy S24 Ultra
2279
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SM8650-AC 512GB, 12GB RAM
Zenfone 11 Ultra Zenfone 11 Ultra
2275
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 512GB, 16GB RAM
Oppo Find X7 Ultra Oppo Find X7 Ultra
2194
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 512GB, 16GB RAM
vivo X100 Ultra vivo X100 Ultra
2191
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 1TB, 16GB RAM
Sony Xperia 1 VI Sony Xperia 1 VI
2125
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 256GB. 12GB RAM
Pixel 9 Pro Pixel 9 Pro
1964
Google Tensor G4 128GB, 16GB RAM
Huawei Pura 70 Ultra Huawei Pura 70 Ultra
1446
Kirin 9010 1TB, 16GB RAM

AnTuTu 10

iPhone 16 Pro iPhone 16 Pro
1871052
Apple A18 Pro 256GB, 8GB RAM 1206 x 2622 px
iPhone 16 Pro Max iPhone 16 Pro Max
1838828
Apple A18 Pro 512GB, 8GB RAM 1320 x 2868 px
iPhone 16 Plus iPhone 16 Plus
1727276
Apple A18 128GB, 8GB RAM 1290 x 2796 px
iPhone 16 iPhone 16
1721149
Apple A18 128GB, 8GB RAM 1179 x 2556 px
iPhone 15 Pro iPhone 15 Pro
1566329
Apple A17 Pro 256GB, 8GB RAM 1179 x 2556 px
iPhone 14 Pro iPhone 14 Pro
1462912
Apple A16 Bionic 256GB, 6GB RAM 1179 x 2556 px

3DMark (offscreen)

  • Wild Life Extreme (2160p)
  • Solar Bay (1440p)
Zenfone 11 Ultra Zenfone 11 Ultra
5246
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1080 x 2400 px
Galaxy S24 Ultra Galaxy S24 Ultra
4983
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SM8650-AC Adreno 750 1440 x 3120 px
Xiaomi 14 Ultra Xiaomi 14 Ultra
4977
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1440 x 3200 px
vivo X100 Ultra vivo X100 Ultra
4934
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1440 x 3200 px
iPhone 16 Pro iPhone 16 Pro
4898
Apple A18 Pro Apple GPU (6-core) 1206 x 2622 px
Oppo Find X7 Ultra Oppo Find X7 Ultra
4806
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1440 x 3168 px
iPhone 16 Pro Max iPhone 16 Pro Max
4731
Apple A18 Pro Apple GPU (6-core) 1320 x 2868 px
Sony Xperia 1 VI Sony Xperia 1 VI
4731
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1080 x 2340 px
iPhone 16 Plus iPhone 16 Plus
4324
Apple A18 Apple GPU (5-core) 1290 x 2796 px
iPhone 16 iPhone 16
4295
Apple A18 Apple GPU (5-core) 1179 x 2556 px
iPhone 15 Pro iPhone 15 Pro
3712
Apple A17 Pro Apple GPU (6-core graphics) 1179 x 2556 px
iPhone 14 Pro iPhone 14 Pro
2705
Apple A16 Bionic Apple GPU (5-core) 1179 x 2556 px
Pixel 9 Pro Pixel 9 Pro
2574
Google Tensor G4 Mali-G715 MC7 1280 x 2856 px
Huawei Pura 70 Ultra Huawei Pura 70 Ultra
1578
Kirin 9010 Maleoon 910 1260 x 2844 px
Galaxy S24 Ultra Galaxy S24 Ultra
8780
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SM8650-AC Adreno 750 1440 x 3120 px
Zenfone 11 Ultra Zenfone 11 Ultra
8730
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1080 x 2400 px
Oppo Find X7 Ultra Oppo Find X7 Ultra
8547
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1440 x 3168 px
Xiaomi 14 Ultra Xiaomi 14 Ultra
8413
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1440 x 3200 px
Sony Xperia 1 VI Sony Xperia 1 VI
8393
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1080 x 2340 px
vivo X100 Ultra vivo X100 Ultra
8389
Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Adreno 750 1440 x 3200 px
iPhone 16 Pro Max iPhone 16 Pro Max
7880
Apple A18 Pro Apple GPU (6-core) 1320 x 2868 px
iPhone 16 Pro iPhone 16 Pro
7858
Apple A18 Pro Apple GPU (6-core) 1206 x 2622 px
iPhone 16 iPhone 16
6875
Apple A18 Apple GPU (5-core) 1179 x 2556 px
iPhone 16 Plus iPhone 16 Plus
6691
Apple A18 Apple GPU (5-core) 1290 x 2796 px
iPhone 15 Pro iPhone 15 Pro
6525
Apple A17 Pro Apple GPU (6-core graphics) 1179 x 2556 px
iPhone 14 Pro iPhone 14 Pro
4308
Apple A16 Bionic Apple GPU (5-core) 1179 x 2556 px

You can also see the massive jump between the different generations of NPUs inside the iPhone chips via the Geekbench AI scores.

GeekBench AI (NPU)

iPhone 16 Pro iPhone 16 Pro
44969
iPhone 16 iPhone 16
44751
iPhone 16 Plus iPhone 16 Plus
44704
iPhone 16 Pro Max iPhone 16 Pro Max
44399
iPhone 15 Pro iPhone 15 Pro
32532
iPhone 15 Pro Max iPhone 15 Pro Max
32100

Apple has promised better heat dissipation for this generation of iPhones and thus - better sustained performance. And it has delivered! The CPU scored 78% of stability. The GPU stability has increased from 74% (same test, iOS 18) to 90%, which is lovely.

CPU test - Apple iPhone 16 Pro review GPU test - Apple iPhone 16 Pro review GPU test - Apple iPhone 16 Pro review
CPU test • GPU test

The Apple A18 Pro is not a ground-breaking improvement, it is your typical incremental upgrade with minor boost across the board. But we are surely happy with the improvements, especially the better sustained performance, and it is safe to say the iPhone 16 Pro is one of the most powerful smartphones out there, be it for gaming, video editing, and more.

Reader comments

Just read the review on the Apple iPhone 16 Pro, and wow—it sounds like Apple has really outdone themselves this time! The upgraded camera system and display enhancements seem perfect for anyone into photography or gaming. The faster processor is als...

  • Hamlas
  • 19 Oct 2024
  • IWS

I'm happy

Which ram uses in 16pro and 16pro max?