The rumour mill is suggesting that the new iPhone 17e will be making an appearance towards the end of February.
That tracks, given that it was the same time last year that the iPhone 16e made its debut, and Apple tends to be a bit of a company of habit when it comes to release cycles and dates.
Aimed at a budget-conscious audience, or perhaps those who hadn’t upgraded their iPhone in a long while, the iPhone 16e was a “cheap” (for Apple) entry point into the iPhone ecosystem, and also one of the lowest cost ways to access Apple Intelligence too.
The low price point came with a few compromises – the biggest one for photographers likely being the single-camera unit on the back, which in 2025 seemed a bit of a let-down, when even cheap Android models have two, or sometimes three cameras on the back.
Still, that camera was pretty good, so if pushed I’d probably agree that I’d rather have one great camera than three mediocre ones.
But there was one feature – or lack thereof – which I found more unforgiveable, and that was the limitations placed on the iPhone 16e’s portrait mode.
You see, it only works on humans, and nothing else. Unlike other iPhones, such as the iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17, and iPhone 16 Pro, portrait mode can be used for humans, dogs, cats – and I’ve even seen it work with a terrapin I stumbled across once (don’t ask).
But with the iPhone 16e, that functionality has been switched off – and I don’t really understand why. It’s not a hardware limitation – if it can create a portrait effect with a human using a single lens, then that proves that. Therefore, it’s a software limitation, presumably designed to strip the iPhone 16e of features and prompt people to spend more money on an iPhone 17 or other, more expensive model.
It’s also frustrating that you can’t add the Portrait effect after you’ve shot the photo too – another thing which you can do on other models, but is frustratingly absent here.
All in all, it feels like a cynical thing to do – after all, the target market of these cheaper phones is very likely to be people who might want to take photos of their pets, as well as the other humans in their lives.
Apple has an opportunity to fix this with the iPhone 17e and make it a much more friendly budget option – I’ll be paying close attention to the keynote to see if it gets mentioned!
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