Based on the 500m queue to get into Sydney Olympic Park when I left, this weekend’s Everything Electric show is going to be popular. The show centres on electric cars, but also electric charging, solar, batteries, and even electric lawn mowers.
Plug-in hybrid utes are set to take off
Beyond more Chinese electric brands entering Australia is the battle for the plug-in hybrid ute. Joining BYD, Chery, GWM, and MG, new models have been announced. These are proper 4WDs with hybrid engines capable of 3.5-tonne towing, all battling it out for what has been the top-selling vehicle category for the last few years.
Images: Angus Jones.
Also interesting: beyond Hyundai, none of the traditional top-selling car brands were present.
Vehicle-to-grid savings could be lucrative
Another trend was in the V2G (vehicle-to-grid) space, where you use your car’s battery to power your home and potentially sell power back into the grid.
Image: Angus Jones
Encouraging Australians to get on board, Amber has partnered with BYD to run a local trial where customers get a 6% discount on their BYD, essentially paying for the V2G infrastructure. Amber mentioned one customer on the trial making $700 one night by selling power to the grid. Although this return is rare, we will see V2G become a reality in homes soon.
Electric chargers get smarter and more plentiful
Sydney’s 2026 Everything Electric event also showed that electric car chargers are becoming more accessible. Companies like myenergi sell smart home chargers for less than $1,000 that let you harvest power from your solar panels, helping you use most of your free power from the sun. This is a big improvement in the tech at such a low price.
Ausgrid, on the other hand, is planning power-pole chargers where, no matter who your home retailer is, you can charge your car on the street and have the cost appear on your monthly home electricity bill.
Images: Angus Jones.
Other fun things at the show, besides test-driving the latest electric cars, included an exoskeleton that reduces physical exertion by 40%, electric outboards, and an Australian-designed moped with a 120 km range and an 8 km/h top speed.
Images: Angus Jones.
If you’re keen to take a look for yourself, Everything Electric Sydney is on now until 20 September 2026.
The rise of open-ear headphones continues, with Bose launching two new earbuds in Australia: the Sport Open Earbuds and the second-gen Ultra Open Earbuds.
Recent research indicated that open-ear headphones are quickly growing in popularity, taking market share from over-ear and in-ear variants. It’s a trend that headphone makers are capitalising on, with more brands debuting different types of open-ear buds, including clip-on headphones from Sennheiser and even Hisense.
Both of Bose’s new buds are the clip-on variety, gently clasping onto the bottom of wearers’ ears. As the name suggests, the $349.95 Bose Sport Open Earbuds are designed for workouts, with a sweat-resistant IP54 rating. Even with the open-ear design, which avoids sitting deep in one’s ear, Bose says the buds are made to stay in place, even during rigorous exercise.
Thankfully, with all the moving around expected while wearing these, the Sport Open Earbuds have physical buttons for playback control. Gesture-based controls are a nightmare with sweaty hands, so it’s a smart move. Bose also claims up to seven hours of music playback on a single charge. When combined with the included charging case, the Sport Open Earbuds get an extra 22 hours of total use.
Both sets of buds have an “Auto Volume” feature that adjusts playback volume based on ambient noise. Without touching any controls, the volume increases in noisy environments, and ducks in quieter surrounds.
Louder and stronger
Now in its second iteration, the $449.95 Bose Ultra Open Earbuds (2nd Gen) have better audio and call quality, according to the brand. Bose claims that a new driver produces deeper bass and louder volume than the first model. These buds also get a new “Cinema Mode”, which aims to produce a more expansive sound when paired with videos or podcasts.
Bose advertises the flagship buds with up to nine hours of audio playback per bud. An extra 19.5 hours comes courtesy of the included charging case. Each set of buds connects wirelessly using Bluetooth 5.4, with Multipoint support enabling two simultaneous device connections.
Launching on 1 October, pre-orders for the Ultra Open Earbuds and Sport Open Earbuds begin on 19 September via Bose’s website and audio retailers. Black and White Smoke colours are available across both models, with the sports pair getting a limited-edition Eucalyptus Green finish. Meanwhile, the Ultra gets additional Cherry Chocolate, Olive Green, and Sky Pink colours.
Bose also confirmed a firmware release following the 1 October launch, which will add Google Find Hub, Alexa+, and Apple Music shortcut support.
If you told me five years ago that I would one day love high-resolution TVs with an anti-glare coating, I would have laughed at you. Anti-glare coatings used to be something you’d only use if you didn’t care about distorting colour or sharpness. But now, Samsung has sold something to some kind of deity to produce the ultimate anti-glare coating that still allows an excellent picture to shine through while stopping the sun from ruining it. Finally, we have defeated the sun.
Samsung’s Micro RGB R95H TV is a technical marvel. Though this latest flagship TV is not perfect, it’s still very good.
I reviewed the 85-inch model, and my first impression was that the Samsung Micro RGB R95H is big yet impressively thin, with all its insides tucked into the panel. It’s essentially a supermodel. However, I do really miss the One Connect box found on other Samsung models. Having to go behind the TV to plug in HDMI cables and whatnot feels so old-fashioned after years of enjoying the separate wireless box that came with my older big-screen Samsung TV.
Images: Alice Clarke.
Setup was super easy, as expected. After attaching the stand and putting the TV on my TV cabinet, I logged into my Samsung account and streaming apps, and was ready to go.
Samsung Micro RGB R95H specifications and price
Backlight technology
Micro RGB
Sizes
65 inches 75 inches 85 inches (review model)
Resolution
3840 x 2160 (4K)
Native Refresh Rate
165 Hz VRR (100 Hz Native)
HDR technologies
Micro RGB HDR Pro HDR10+ (Adaptive / Gaming / Advanced) AI Auto HDR Remastering Pro
The whole point of Micro RGB is that it can have the most accurate colours and highest brightness, while getting very close to the light control of OLED. Having the cost of Micro RGB come down this much this quickly, even if it is still horrendously high, is a great sign for people wanting an alternative to OLED for bright rooms.
Subjective viewing
I essentially live in a glasshouse. It’s one of those apartments where all the external walls are windows, which is great until you want to watch TV at lunchtime. Having the Micro RGB R95H standing in front of my normal, pro-glare Samsung TV, the contrast is stark. My older TV is a black mirror reflecting the world around it, while the 85-inch R95H is unfazed by the glorious sunlight that surrounds it. I will miss this TV when it goes.
Seeing my older Samsung TV poking over the top, the difference between anti-reflective coatings is stark. Image: Alice Clarke.
Actually sitting down to watch TV, the improved light and colour performance and control are evident.
Watching Gravity on 4K Blu-Ray, a movie where the darkness of space is as important as the literal sun and bright debris, is a perfect test. I was impressed by just how black the blacks were, and how little haloing there was on the bright white patches throughout the scene. One of the most obvious ways to tell if a TV is good is that when you try to find little details on the screen in a scene, you keep forgetting because you get lost in the scene. This was one of those TVs.
In Supergirl (2026), I was taken by how vibrant the colours are. Some TVs wash out the reds and blues of Supergirl’s uniform, and yet here they were allowed to be aggressive primary colours on the Micro RGB R95H.
Sports was less of a win; the ball got a bit blurry when watching the footy on free-to-air over the weekend.
Image: Alice Clarke.
However, upscaling on older shows was great. Season one of both One Tree Hill and Buffy the Vampire Slayer was noisy as hell because of all those beautiful film artefacts, as expected. But they both still looked crisp and like they were filmed to be shown on an 85-inch TV rather than the microscopic CRT TVs they were originally destined for. They had a clarity I don’t see on cheaper TVs with worse upscaling.
The Carmilla web series on YouTube was made for approximately 20 cents a decade ago, and yet upscaled to 4K, you wouldn’t know its technical limitations. That Micro RGB AI Engine clearly has the goods to bring older, lower-quality footage into this decade.
Gaming
Here is where the true test of the TV came: playing games on Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 Pro.
The first thing that hit me when switching over to game mode was the brightness. The TV gets so bright, it’s like a physical presence. It is a face punch of brightness. HDR textures are vivid in game mode, but at the cost of my retinas when playing at night. It’s like staring directly into the sun.
After adjusting the brightness down a bit, I was extremely impressed by how well it displays textures. One of my favourite things about the NBA 2K series is the level of detail that’s put into the arenas, down to the brand of light bulb used, and that shines so clearly on this TV. It really does look like I’m at the Staples Centre watching the Clippers snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
The refresh rate is excellent, even if the processing is a bit noticeable at times.
Jumping into Forza Horizon 6, I noticed that the motion blur was far more intense on the Micro RGB R95H than on my older 8K Samsung QLED TV. The scenery was much sharper, and the textures had way more detail, but the motion on the car made me feel a little sick.
Objective testing
Moving to the GadgetGuy TV test patterns, I’m very impressed, for the most part.
First I put the TV on Filmmaker Mode, which has a brightness of 30, contrast of 45, sharpness of 0, colour 25, Tint (G/R) 0/0, and I switched the colour tone to Standard.
In a dark room (as dark as my living room gets), I was incredibly impressed by the colour accuracy and how good the light control is when viewed head-on. However, from non-optimal viewing angles (sitting 1m in front of the TV, head on to the left side of the screen, occasionally looking to the right), I could see how the anti-reflective coating hampered some of the colour accuracy because of the light diffusion.
Image: Alice Clarke.
Looking at the primary colour ramps, each colour stayed in its own bar and graduated neatly between the various hues. The red stayed red regardless of its brightness.
The white field was uniform from optimal viewing angles, but lost that uniformity when sitting at a non-optimal angle. Same with red, green, grey and blue.
The black level was certainly very deeply black, with no clouding.
Image: Samsung.
On the 1px checkerboard test, there was no shimmering; all the pixels remained neatly in their spots.
On the dark saturated colours test, the darkest red box did take on a slight brown hue, which was suboptimal.
The only test that really disappointed me, though, was the moving box test. It was extremely juddery, had some blur, and was generally not smooth at all. Not even a little bit smooth.
Motion scrolling text had the same problem, juddering all the way up the screen. The text was very clear in spite of the judder, and there was very minimal haloing.
In fact, on every test there was the slightest amount of haloing, but nothing major, and far less than almost any other LED TV I can remember testing.
Overall, aside from motion, I am extremely impressed by this TV.
Software, remote, and user experience
I still hate how many ads are built into the home screen of Samsung TVs. My strong belief is that if you have bought a premium TV, you should be able to use it without additional advertising. I understand that selling user data and presenting users with ads is a big money maker for Samsung; I just also think that perhaps buying a $9,999 TV should be enough of a contribution to Samsung’s bottom line.
My strong feelings extend to the streaming service buttons on the remote. I think users should be able to reprogram those buttons to the services and apps they actually use. Again, I understand that these streaming companies are paying a lot of money to be on the remote in the hope that users choose the path of least resistance and just sign up, and that it’s the same across all TV manufacturers. I just think that’s a bit of a gross practice.
Image: Alice Clarke.
That said, the menu screens are a lot easier to navigate this year, and are less cluttered. It’s quicker and easier to get to inputs and settings, and generally seems more user-friendly. The Samsung TV Plus channels are always welcome. At the moment there’s a channel dedicated to just showing reruns of Law & Order, and I think that’s delightful. Great background viewing.
The new remote shape is more ergonomic, and I like it a lot. There is an AI button on there for people who like that kind of thing.
Sound
Usually, it’s not even worth bothering to review the speakers in a super thin TV, because they are generally garbage. However, I am really impressed with the built-in speakers in the 85-inch Micro RGB R95H. Way more bass than I would normally expect from TV speakers.
I would still want a soundbar, and Samsung sells one in the Q-Series Soundbar HW-Q990H for $1,999, which is very good for the price. Those buying a $9,999 TV likely would be better served by a more premium setup, like a Sonos system, or something more bespoke from a premium Hi-Fi shop. But the Samsung Q-Series Soundbar HW-Q990H is a very good choice for less than $2,000.
Who is the Samsung Micro RGB R95H for?
This is the TV for people who want accurate colours in bright rooms. It’s the TV for gamers and ultra-high-definition movie enjoyers.
I’m not entirely convinced it’s the TV for sports fans. But it is definitely the TV for people who have a lot of money and want to be on the cutting edge of screen technology. I also cannot emphasise enough how good this anti-reflective screen is for bright rooms.
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Samsung Micro RGB R95H
The Samsung Micro RGB R95H TV is a technical marvel with superb colours and almost unmatched light control. It’s also $9,999.
Performance
9
Features
8
Ease of use
9
Design
8
Value for money
7
Positives
Superb colour quality
Fantastic light control
Excellent anti-reflective coating
Negatives
Motion judder is an issue when extra processing is turned off
Stairs are traditionally a robot vacuum’s worst enemy, but this might not be the case for much longer. Earlier in the year, Roborock debuted the Saros Rover, a robot vacuum with legs that can climb stairs, moving between floors to clean homes from top to bottom. More recently, the Saros Rover appeared again at IFA 2026, showing that the stair-climbing robot may be more than a one-off concept.
Roborock designed the robot to mimic “human mobility”, able to control its legs independently to get up and down stairs. While on a step, the Saros Rover can even pivot and clean the surface as it scales each stair.
While the Roborock Saros Rover doesn’t have a confirmed release date, it seems to be a technology that is nearing commercial use. Current robot vacuums can clean multiple storeys, but only when you manually carry them from one floor to the next. If something like the Saros Rover becomes publicly available, it could eliminate yet another layer of friction in home cleaning.
Dubbed ‘Flow’ because of its roller mop technology, the $2,799 Saros 20 Flow — due out by the end of the month — applies more downward pressure than spinning mop pad technology. With this design, the robot should be able to get more sticky messes off hard floors.
Saros 20 Flow. Image: Roborock.
Meanwhile, the Qrevo Edge 3 Pro (also $2,799 in Australia) sports the same 36,000Pa suction power as the Saros 20 Flow. The main difference is that the latest Qrevo uses spinning mop pads for wet cleaning instead. Because of this, it’s shorter (7.95cm tall versus the Saros 20 Flow’s 8.98cm height) and can fit under more furniture.
So, the main deciding factor between the two is whether you prioritise raw mopping power or the ability to clean under low-hanging furniture. After the Saros 20 Flow launches this month, the Qrevo Edge 3 Pro is out in Australia this October.
Home Wi-Fi needn’t be complicated and frustrating. The best home networks just work when you need them, without needing extensive technical expertise. That’s why GadgetGuy is giving away an eero 7 three-pack to one lucky winner!
Part of the eero range of Wi-Fi 7 mesh routers, the eero 7 is a great starting point. Supporting upwards of 120 devices and covering up to 560m², it’s a Wi-Fi system that’s simple to set up while supplying internet to all corners of your home.
Australian internet speeds got a major boost with last year’s NBN speed upgrade. Many households suddenly received 500Mbps download speeds at no extra cost. But plenty of people with older routers can’t take full advantage of the faster speeds.
Fortunately, the eero 7 provides an immediate upgrade out of the box. Equipped with the latest Wi-Fi 7 technology, the eero 7 supports wireless speeds of up to 1.8Gbps, and wired speeds up to 2.5Gbps via Ethernet. When you have a lot of devices needing internet access simultaneously, that bandwidth is a big help.
Best of all, the eero 7 connects with other eero routers seamlessly, producing a home-encompassing mesh system. This ensures upstairs gets the same reliable internet connection as downstairs, reducing dead spots in the far reaches of bigger houses.
How to win an eero 7 three-pack
Thanks to eero, GadgetGuy has one eero 7 three-pack to give away, valued at $749.99. Want the chance to win this handy mesh Wi-Fi system? Read on for all the instructions.
To begin, fill in your details using the form below. Included in the form are various entry methods using different social media platforms. The more entry methods you complete, the greater your chance of winning.
Entries are open now until 4:00 PM AEST on September 30 2026. Eligible entrants include Australian residents aged 18 and over. For the full eligibility criteria, check out the entry form, which lists all the terms and conditions.
Apple has done something to the iPhone 18 Pro that it has never done to an iPhone camera before. It has put a real, moving aperture inside it. Every iPhone camera up to this point had one fixed aperture. This is the first that can change it while you shoot.
That is a hardware change, not a software one, and hardware changes on a phone camera are rare enough to be worth stopping on. Apple has also rebuilt the cooling, jumped the battery figures a long way, and shipped the whole thing alongside iOS 27 and a new Siri that is still in beta.
I have been shooting with both the 18 Pro and the 18 Pro Max since returning from a briefing in Cupertino where I filmed a jazz set in a very dark room a fair bit of walking around my neighbourhood. Here is what the variable aperture actually does, what the cooling is worth, and who should be spending the money.
We love burgundy. Credit: Valens Quinn
iPhone 18 Pro specifications and price
Display
6.3-inch (Pro) and 6.9-inch (Pro Max) Super Retina XDR, ProMotion up to 120Hz, Always-On
Peak brightness
3000 nits outdoor peak
Build
Aluminium unibody, Ceramic Shield 2 front, Ceramic Shield back
Main camera
48MP Fusion with variable aperture, f/1.48 to f/4, six laser-cut blades
Ultra wide camera
48MP Fusion, fixed aperture
Telephoto camera
48MP Fusion with tetra-prism design, 4x and 8x, up to 8x optical-quality zoom
Front camera
18MP Center Stage with square sensor
Video
Cinematic effects applied after capture up to 60fps, 4K Dolby Vision time-lapse, Audio Mix with music isolation
Next-generation vapour chamber with three times the surface area of the iPhone 17 Pro
Wireless
N1 chip with Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6 and Thread, C2 cellular modem
Battery
Up to 34 hours video playback (Pro), up to 43 hours (Pro Max)
Charging
Pro to 50 per cent in around 15 minutes wired, Pro Max five minutes for around seven hours of video playback
Storage and finishes
256GB, 512GB, 1TB and 2TB in black, silver, glacier and burgundy
Operating system
iOS 27
Price (RRP)
From A$2,099 (iPhone 18 Pro), from A$2,299 (iPhone 18 Pro Max)
Availability
Pre-orders from 12 September 2026, on sale 18 September 2026
Specifications supplied by Apple. Prices are Australian recommended retail including GST.
Design and build
I had both the Pro and the Pro Max in burgundy and in black, and the burgundy is the one I would buy. It is subtle rather than loud, and it reads as sumptuous and rich in a way that phone colours usually do not. The black is very black, the darkest Apple has used on the Pro line, but it still has a nice sheen to it rather than going flat.
The glass panel on the back is a separate piece to the aluminium, but it is integrated cleanly enough that it reads as one surface rather than two parts bolted together. The camera bump is sculpted rather than stepped, and the lens rings match the body colour, which is a small thing that makes a big difference to how deliberate the whole back looks. The Apple logo is shiny against the matte finish, so it catches the light on its own.
And here are all the other colours…black, silver, glacier and burgundy. Credit: Apple
The enclosure is an aluminium unibody in a 7000 series alloy rather than the titanium of the iPhone 16 Pro – which I really liked. The front is Ceramic Shield 2, which Apple says is three times more scratch resistant, and the back is Ceramic Shield with four times more resistance to cracks.
Screen and Dynamic Island
The Dynamic Island is a welcome change. It is smaller, and it now supports three different app activities at once rather than two, which matters more than it sounds if you are the sort of person who has a timer, a flight and a rideshare all running together.
The wider dynamic island can show 3 items now. Credit: Apple
At the briefing in Cupertino, Apple had a microscope set up so we could look at how the infrared camera is now hidden under the glass. As far as I could see, they have used a coarser pixel design, effectively spreading the red, green and blue elements out around the camera so the lens can see through the display.
The screen itself is nice and bright. ProMotion up to 120Hz and the Always-On display carry over unchanged, and both models now peak at 3000 nits outdoors with better anti-reflection.
The camera: what variable aperture actually does
Most people hear variable aperture and think Portrait mode, done properly in hardware. It is closer to the opposite.
Portrait mode creates a shallow depth of field look, which is great for separating the foreground from the background. The hardware change in the 18 Pro goes the other way. The depth of field gets deeper, meaning more of the scene is in focus.
This shows the dynamic aperture’s different effects – at f/4 the pyramid in the rear is sharp, but soft at f/1.48, but both images are similar in brigthess. Credit: Valens Quinn
Samsung already tried this. It had a dual aperture that launched with the Galaxy S9 in 2018, switching between f/1.5 and f/2.4. Samsung ran it for a couple of years and then dropped it with the Galaxy S20. The difference is that Samsung’s was really a two position toggle. This is a real iris, with six laser-cut blades, and it comes with a developer API as well, so the benefits of the hardware can be used by apps like Instagram or WhatsApp rather than only in Apple’s own Camera app.
Keeping the aperture at f/1.48 is a great way to get motion blur into your shots. Credit Valens Quinn
The range runs from f/1.48 to f/4, and wide open it pulls in about 50 per cent more light. It works at every main camera focal length, including the built-in 2x.
Another example showing how the f/4 smaller aperture keeps the image sharper further away. Credit: Valens Quinn
Here is the part that trips people up. Shoot the same scene wide open and stopped down and both frames look about equally bright, with maybe a slight colour shift between them. That is the auto exposure equalising them. The difference is not brightness at all. It is what is sharp.
Setting it main camera at f/4 and aiming at a single point of light will show off the star effect from 6 aperture blades. Credit: Valens Quinn
Wide open buys you roughly two and a third stops, which the camera can then spend on a faster shutter. That means sharper subjects when things are moving. Shoot two objects at different distances wide open and the one at the back goes soft. Shoot a car going past wide open and it blurs, then shoot it at f/4 and it is sharp.
Motion blur or sharp – take your pick! Credit: Apple
The other effect is the sunstar. Six blades give you a six-pointed star on any point light source, and only at f/4. That is one thing software genuinely cannot fake.
Pro controls
All of this happens automatically, but you can drive it yourself in the new Pro controls, and this is a really welcome update to the camera software. You can customise the top tray and put what you want in it, so you get manual aperture, shutter speed and white balance, which is useful because the iPhone does sometimes struggle with white balance. There is a histogram in there too. I would like it to be a bit larger, but you can at least move its position.
The customisable tray at the top is where you can access many controls like aperture, shutter, exposure and white balance – yay! Credit: Apple
The other lenses and Photographic Styles
The ultra wide and the telephoto round out the creative options, but the attention this year is clearly on the main lens. The variable aperture applies up to the 2x, and the ultra wide is still fixed, so none of this applies at 0.5x. Perhaps in a future model we will see it supported across the other lenses.
Photographic Styles are a nice to have rather than a headline. The new texture and grain controls are the addition worth knowing about, and the grain control in particular softens skin in a way that some people will be glad of. There are lots of things to play around with in there.
Video is where it gets more interesting
The stills side is the story Apple is telling, but video is where I think this gets more interesting.
I shot a jazz set with no direct lights and no rig, just the phone, in a genuinely dark room. The phone is pulling light in from that wide open aperture across several frames to hold detail without blurring. Apple has also improved the default 1080p 30 low light capability, which combines frames when the auto frames per second kicks in.
Great low-light performance thanks to the variable aperture when filming some jazz. Audio was dialed in too thanks to the 4 mics. Credit: Valens Quinn
The part I did not expect is the audio. There are four studio-quality mics, and Apple’s new algorithms separate voice and music from background noise. Audio Mix can now isolate music, which is new, and on a live recording the difference between the raw capture and the processed version is not subtle.
Cinematic effects used to need their own mode. Now you shoot normally and apply the effect afterwards in Photos, at up to 60 frames a second, so you can get that sense of depth out of an ordinary recording.
Smart focus tracking is the other one worth knowing. Double tap a subject and it holds focus as they move, or as the camera moves, through the scene. It works even if the subject leaves the frame and comes back, which is the whole point. You do not want it hunting for the background the moment someone steps out of shot.
It is not a cinema camera, and the low light performance does fall apart if you push it far enough. It is very good, but there are still compromises.
Check out our video review to see the more recordings and photos:
Apple Reference Image
Here is a problem that did not really exist five years ago. Anyone can now generate a photograph that looks completely real. Apple has done something about it, and almost nobody is talking about it.
Shoot in the new Reference mode and the sensor itself signs the image at the moment of capture. Private Cloud Compute then develops that signed sensor data into an unalterable reference image, which you can view in Photos alongside the main image. It works like a digital negative. Any modification to the photo can be traced back against the original.
Great to see the Reference Image feature, which is like a ‘digital negative’ for photos. Credit: Apple
It is worth being precise about what this proves. It proves the sensor saw this. It does not prove the scene was honest. That is still a useful thing to have, particularly for photojournalists.
It is opt-in, and it is not everywhere yet. In China it is not available at launch for regulatory reasons, and in the EU you can view and develop reference images but not capture them on the 18 Pro at launch. Apple also says SynthID support arrives in a software update later this year, which is a separate, cross-platform way of flagging that AI has been applied to an image.
Heat, and why it matters more than the chip
The 18 Pro has a next-generation vapour chamber with three times the surface area of the one in the 17 Pro. At the briefing in Cupertino, Apple had the old chamber on one side and the new one on the other, the same heat load through both, and a thermal camera showing how the heat dispersed. The 18 spreads it across the whole device instead of building a hotspot down the midline.
iPhone 18 Pro’s new vapor chamber vs the iPhone 17 Pro. The thermal readout shows a more even heat spread versus the hot spot on the iPhone 17 Pro (left side phone). Credit: Valens Quinn
That matters for the obvious reason, which is that you do not want a phone uncomfortable to hold or sitting hot in your pocket. It also matters for a less obvious reason. Thermals can count for more than a fast chip, because chips get throttled when they get too hot. Any phone can go fast for 30 seconds. Then it heats up and the software slows it down.
Apple claims up to 40 per cent better sustained performance than the 17 Pro, and up to double against the 16 Pro. So I ran the 18 Pro until it stopped being fast, using the 3DMark Wild Life Extreme Stress Test, and put a Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra through the same test for comparison. Neither got too hot to hold, though the Samsung did feel subjectively a bit warmer.
Test
iPhone 18 Pro Max
Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra
3DMark Wild Life Extreme, best loop
7944
7253
3DMark Wild Life Extreme, lowest loop
5523
3682
3DMark Wild Life Extreme, stability
69.5%
50.8%
Geekbench 7, single core
3965
3027
Geekbench 7, multi core
11247
10093
Geekbench 7, GPU
Test failed
Not compared
Speedometer 3.1 browser benchmark
65.3
47.2
Higher is better on every row. Stability is the lowest loop score as a percentage of the best loop score. Tested September 2026.
The two phones are nine per cent apart at peak and about fifty per cent apart under sustained load. The iPhone held far more of its frame rate as the test went on, which is exactly what the cooling is for.
The Geekbench 7 GPU test failed outright on both models, which is most likely because Geekbench has not updated for this chip yet. I had the phone before release. On the browser side, Speedometer 3.1 put the 18 Pro at 65.3 against 51.7 for the iPhone 17 Pro, which is about 26 per cent ahead.
Results on 3DMark’s stress tests showing that that the iPhone 18 Pro Max can manage heat loads without major throttling with the help of its new vapour chamber.
The chip is the A20 Pro, built on a 2-nanometre process. The headline numbers are a 6-core CPU, a 7-core GPU up to 40 per cent faster than the A19 Pro, a dual 16-core Neural Engine, and 50 per cent more memory bandwidth. The bandwidth is the one that actually shows up in use.
Gaming on the Pro Max with that large screen was a pleasure. I played Genshin Impact at maximum graphics settings and it looked great, with a frame rate that stayed fluid.
Battery and charging
Apple claims up to 34 hours of video playback on the Pro and up to 43 hours on the Pro Max. That is a big bump, and both figures come from Apple rather than from me.
Battery life is genuinely hard to pin down in a review week, because it depends so much on how you use the phone. What I can tell you is that I got two full days out of the Max without needing to plug it in, which is the sort of result that changes how you think about a phone.
On charging, Apple says the Pro goes to 50 per cent in around 15 minutes wired, or 30 minutes wirelessly, and that five minutes of wired charging on the Pro Max gives around seven hours of video playback. I put the Max on a 60W charger for five minutes and got about 17 per cent back.
Connectivity
Connectivity is as you would expect, and the useful part is that Wi-Fi 7 is genuinely there. Both models carry Apple’s N1 wireless chip, which brings Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6 and Thread. The 18 Pro also introduces the C2 cellular modem, which Apple says delivers meaningfully faster uploads than the C1X while using 15 per cent less energy.
iOS 27, Siri AI and the caveats
iOS 27 is out, and the headline is Siri AI. It is in beta, English to start, with French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese and Spanish coming in October.
The part that has not had enough attention is that the features running in Apple’s cloud have daily limits. Apple has not said what those limits are, beyond that they vary by feature, request complexity and system demand, and it has said that expanded access above them will cost money in future. To be clear about what that means, it is not that Siri AI becomes a paid product. It is that there is an undisclosed free allowance, and going past it will eventually cost.
In the EU, Siri AI is not available on iPhone at launch, along with anything that depends on it.
One practical thing that catches people out. A new iPhone rebuilds its search index from scratch, and that can take days. Apple says the index is device specific, so even a restored phone has to build its own. If your new 18 Pro seems to know nothing about you for the first few days, that is why.
iPhone 18 Pro vs iPhone 17 Pro
iPhone 17 Pro
iPhone 18 Pro
Main camera aperture
Fixed
Variable, f/1.48 to f/4, six laser-cut blades
Pro controls in the Camera app
Not available
Manual aperture, shutter speed, white balance and histogram
Apple Reference Image
Not available
Reference mode with signed sensor data
Chip
A19 Pro
A20 Pro on a 2-nanometre process
GPU
A19 Pro
Up to 40 per cent faster than A19 Pro
Memory bandwidth
A19 Pro
50 per cent more than A19 Pro
Vapour chamber
Previous generation
Three times the surface area
Sustained performance
Baseline
Up to 40 per cent better, per Apple
Dynamic Island
Two Live Activities
Smaller, up to three Live Activities
Front glass
Ceramic Shield
Ceramic Shield 2, three times more scratch resistant
Speedometer 3.1 (measured)
51.7
65.3
Comparison figures are Apple’s stated claims except where marked as measured.
Who is it for?
There are three answers, depending on what is in your pocket.
If you are on an iPhone 17 Pro, keep it. This is not your year. The 18 Pro is more capable, but it is not a big enough bump. The camera will take better photos, but it is subtle stuff. What it really does is give the camera system more levers to move in hardware. If it is dark, it can open the aperture wider, let more light in, and rely less on ISO or a slower shutter to brighten things up, which is where blur comes from. Left in automatic, it will quietly help your photos. If you are a creative person who wants to adjust these things yourself, that is a different and more exciting proposition.
The black colour and iPhone 18 Pro size is very pocketable. Credit: Valens Quinn
If you are on an iPhone 15 or 16 Pro, this is the easiest yes I have given in a while. Coming from a 15 Pro, Apple claims up to 50 per cent faster CPU, a faster GPU and up to 11 additional hours of video playback. That is substantial.
If this would be your first Pro, answer four questions for me. Have you ever changed a camera setting manually, on any camera? Do you edit your photos, or post them as shot? Do you shoot video longer than ten minutes at a stretch, or game for more than half an hour? Do you know what a histogram is for?
Four noes and you are paying a premium for hardware you will never trigger. There is a standard iPhone 18 coming, though Apple has not said when. It could be late this year or early next. The iPhone 17 is on shelves now, and it usually gets cheaper once a new Pro lands.
One thing cuts the other way. The battery is the one Pro advantage everybody feels, whatever they shoot and whatever they do on the phone. And if you simply want the best one, that is a fine reason on its own. Just know what you are paying for.
What does variable aperture do on the iPhone 18 Pro?
It physically changes the size of the opening in the main camera lens, from f/1.48 to f/4, using six laser-cut blades. Wide open it gathers about 50 per cent more light, which the camera can spend on a faster shutter for sharper moving subjects. Stopped down to f/4 it puts more of the scene in focus and produces a six-pointed sunstar on point lights.
Does the variable aperture work on all the iPhone 18 Pro lenses?
No. It applies to the main camera, including the built-in 2x. The ultra wide is still a fixed aperture, so none of it applies at 0.5x.
How much does the iPhone 18 Pro cost in Australia?
The iPhone 18 Pro starts at A$2,099 RRP including GST and the iPhone 18 Pro Max starts at A$2,299 RRP including GST. Both come in 256GB, 512GB, 1TB and 2TB.
Is the iPhone 18 Pro worth upgrading to from an iPhone 17 Pro?
For most people, no. The camera improvements are real but subtle in automatic use, and the performance gains show up mainly under sustained load. If you shoot manually and want hardware control over aperture, that is the reason to move.
Is Siri AI available on the iPhone 18 Pro at launch?
It is rolling out in beta with iOS 27, in English to start, with more languages in October. It is not available on iPhone in the EU at launch. Features that run in Apple’s cloud have undisclosed daily limits, and Apple says expanded access will be available for a fee in future.
GadgetGuy’s Valens Quinn attended the Apple launch event in Cupertino CA as a guest of Apple Australia.
iPhone 18 Pro & Pro Max
An excellent camera upgrade and a powerful, class leading phone, with impressive performance and battery life, but you may not need all it delivers.
Performance
9.7
Features
9.1
Design
9
Value for money
8.5
Positives
Additional battery life is a welcome upgrade
Variable aperture camera offers more creative options and more realistic photos
Loads of pro photo and video capture features that compete with high-end equipment
A20 Pro chip delivers amazing performance and efficiency
New thermal design means less heat in your hand when playing games or long content captures
That burgundy
Negatives
Variable aperture feature may not be noticed unless you look for it or want the manual settings
Siri AI features may require additional fees and still in beta
The Pro model is the only choice for those who want the latest iPhone
