The big story
Will the iPhone 15 be completely buttonless?
Rumours suggest that the next generation of iPhone could ditch physical buttons altogether
WHILE THE NEW iPHONE 14 RANGE IS BARELY A COUPLE OF MONTHS OLD, PREDICTIONS FOR APPLE’S NEXT-GENERATION DEVICES (THE iPHONE 15 AND iPHONE 15 PRO) ARE ALREADY STARTING TO EMERGE.
The latest rumour comes from Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who said in a tweet that the “two high-end iPhone 15” models (most likely the iPhone 15 Pro and larger iPhone 15 Pro Max based on Apple’s current naming conventions) may use a solid-state button design based on information from Apple’s suppliers.
Rather than pushing in like mechanical buttons, solid-state inputs don’t move at all, meaning they’re essentially just touch-sensitive surfaces. This wouldn’t be the first time Apple has used a solid-state design for its buttons. Before ousting it almost completely, the Home button on the iPhone 7 and iPhone 8 was a non-mechanical input – and the same design is still used by Apple in the iPhone SE (2022). To help these new buttons feel like the mechanical ones, Kuo has said that Apple will, as it’s done for years with the Touch ID button, use taptic engines to mimic the sensation of pushing a real physical button.