I Tested the iPhone 17 Pro Max. It's Part Midlife Crisis and Part Battery-Life King

iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max

Pros

• The 17 Pro Max's incredible battery life
• The brighter screen looks fantastic
• Center Stage camera with the ability to take landscape selfies vertically is sweet

Cons

• Wished Dual Capture had a 50/50 split
• Live Translation's Siri voice can overlap with speakers'
• iPhone 17 Pro battery life is on par with the iPhone 16 Pro

• I Tested the iPhone 17 Pro Max. It's Part Midlife Crisis and Part Battery-Life King
• Who should buy the iPhone 17 Pro?
• The iPhone 17 Pro Max's battery keeps going and going
• Patrick's iPhone 17 Pro Max battery diary
• iPhone 17 Pro Max design: Orange you glad Apple added colors?
• The 17 Pro Max's new camera makes it a selfie machine
• iOS 26 is the iPhone 17 Pro Max's soul
• iPhone 17 Pro Max final thoughts
• iPhone 17's specs vs. iPhone Air, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max
• How we test phones

From the first moment I picked up the new iPhone 17 Pro Max, I was beguiled by its bold, bright redesign. It's a complete turnaround from the years of Apple's subdued titanium motif. The square camera bump of previous Pro models is now a body-wide bar that Apple calls the "camera plateau." The 17 Pro and Pro Max now come in actual colors -- you won't find one in black or space gray. This phone, especially in cosmic orange, wants you to look at it. It's as if the iPhone 17 Pro Max is flexing its new muscular aluminum unibody and begging, "Please notice my camera plateau." Is the iPhone having a midlife crisis? 

Like a true midlife crisis, you need to look beyond the trendy clothes and whitened teeth to what's going on underneath. And that's where you'll find the iPhone 17 Pro Max's most monumental feature: its battery. Some of those wild outer changes allow more space for a bigger battery on the inside. The result? The iPhone 17 Pro Max has the best battery life of any phone that CNET has ever tested.

The iPhone 17 Pro Max comes in a bright, bold orange color.

Celso Bulgatti/CNET

I've been reviewing the iPhone 17 Pro Max on loan from Apple for the past week, and I was consistently impressed: Even after a full day of heavy use, the battery still had 22% or more left. It also topped both of our battery benchmark tests.

Notice I haven't mentioned AI. While competing phone-makers such as Samsung and Google want you to see their phones as containers for AI, LLMs and generative tricks, Apple wants you to notice that it can design one hell of a phone that just happens to have AI woven into it.

I can't help but contrast the iPhone 17 Pro models to Apple's newest phone. The iPhone Air is thin, light, quiet and graceful -- with a single rear camera and shorter battery life. The 17 Pro Max is bold, loud, aggressive and powerful, and its daring design appeals to me. But features such as its amazing battery life, brighter screen, new selfie camera and iOS 26 are the real reasons to get it.

Watch this: The iPhone 17 Pro Max Has Incredible Battery Life

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Who should buy the iPhone 17 Pro?

You can preorder the iPhone 17 Pro for $1,099 or the iPhone 17 Pro Max for $1,199; both come with 256GB of storage, and you can pay more for additional storage tiers, including a 2TB option available only to the Pro Max. Preorders began Friday, Sept. 12, and the first phones will begin to arrive Friday, Sept. 19. But should you upgrade?

The iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max would be an excellent upgrade for someone coming from an iPhone 14 Pro or older. You get a bigger battery, a better screen, faster charging, newer cameras and a speedier processor that can handle graphics-intensive games and Apple Intelligence.

If you have an iPhone 15 Pro or Pro Max, you don't need these new phones unless that battery capacity on your current phone is low -- and even then, it'd be cheaper to simply have your battery swapped out. And unless you have a gracious disposable income, iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max owners can sit this one out.

The iPhone 17 Pro Max's battery keeps going and going

The iPhone 17 Pro Max runs on Apple's new A19 Pro chip which, combined with a vapor cooling chamber, helps keep the phone from getting hot.

Celso Bulgatti/CNET

During my review, the iPhone 17 Pro Max has been my primary phone and its battery life has been wonderful. I started each day with a full charge and always ended with plenty of battery left -- even after shooting photos and videos or keeping the screen at full brightness while filming the review video.

In CNET's 3-hour video streaming test with the screen at max brightness, the 17 Pro Max lost just 9% -- the less percent lost, the better. The iPhone 17 Pro Max ties the Motorola Razr (2024) for the best score we've seen on that test. Compare that to the iPhone 16 Pro Max and regular iPhone 17 Pro, both of which lost more during the test.

Higher percentages are better. The iPhone 17 Pro Max is an absolute unit when it comes to battery life.

Tharon Green/CNET

In CNET's 45-minute endurance battery test (where we make a video call, play video games, scroll social media and news feeds with the battery starting at 100%), the iPhone 17 Pro Max lost only 1%, which is incredible. That is the best result we've ever gotten for that test. Are you noticing a theme? The regular 17 Pro lost only 2%.

Higher percentages are better. If you're looking for outstanding battery life, you need to check out the 17 Pro Max.

Tharon Green/CNET

Even more impressive is that these results were obtained without using the new Adaptive Power feature, which takes about a week before it starts to improve battery life.

Apple's new A19 Pro chip helps boost power efficiency, while also making the 17 Pro Max feel fast and responsive. I played a number of games on the 17 Pro Max including Destiny's Rising, which looked gorgeous on the display. And even after an hour of game-play, the phone was barely warm.

I bring this up because the 17 Pro and Pro Max are the first iPhones with a vapor cooling chamber that channels heat more efficiently. I can definitely say that the 17 Pro Max gets nowhere as hot as the iPhone 16 Pro Max. However, the 17 Pro did get borderline hot when I used a magnetic battery pack to recharge it on a hot day. I was unable to run performance benchmark tests for this review, but will update this story when I have results.

iPhone 17 Pro Max design: Orange you glad Apple added colors?

I tested the iPhone 17 Pro Max in cosmic orange and noticed how close the color was to other orange items, like pumpkins.

Patrick Holland/CNET

The Pro and Pro Max have a new aluminum chassis which, despite being heavier than last year's titanium-framed Pro models, feels much better to hold without a case. That's partly thanks to the sturdy unibody design and partly to the curved edges, a hybrid of the iPhone 11's rounded sides and the flat edges we've seen since the iPhone 12. 

On the back there is a rectangular cutout where Apple is using Ceramic Shield instead of glass. Ceramic Shield consists of nano ceramic crystals embedded in a glass matrix, which Apple says is four times more resistant to cracks than the iPhone 16 Pro's back glass. It also gives the phone a pseudo two-tone look.

The new rectangular camera bump -- sorry, plateau -- not only adds to the 17 Pro Max's aggressive styling, it actually houses most of the major components of the phone, allowing more space for the battery.

The iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max come in cosmic orange. It's a color that, to quote Brian Setzer, just rocks a bit harder. This bold, bright orange has drawn more "Is that the new iPhone?" questions from passersby during my testing than any other phone I've reviewed. To show you just how orange the iPhone 17 Pro Max is, I snapped a picture of it next to as many orange things as I could find.

How would you describe the 17 Pro Max's orange color?

Jesse Orrall/CNET

The cosmic orange iPhone 17 Pro Max is not quite Cheeto-orange.

Jesse Orrall/CNET

This anthology of short plays, including one by yours truly, is the closest orange to the iPhone 17 Pro Max's cosmic orange.

Patrick Holland/CNET

Depending on the light, the Ceramic Shield cutout can sometimes look lighter than the rest of the 17 Pro Max's body.

Celso Bulgatti/CNET

The 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max also come in dark blue and silver.

Moving on to the front, the 17 Pro has a 6.3-inch screen and the 17 Pro Max a 6.9-inch display. Both screens can now reach a peak brightness of 3,000 nits outdoors, which in my testing looks great. There's even a coating over the display that helps reduce reflections.

The increased brightness outdoors and the reduced reflections really make these displays feel immersive.

Celso Bulgatti/CNET

The display is covered in Ceramic Shield 2, which Apple says has three times better scratch-resistance than the 16 Pro and Pro Max. Of course, if that's not enough, you can always put a case and a screen protector on it.

The 17 Pro Max's new camera makes it a selfie machine

All three rear cameras have a 48-megapixel sensor.

Celso Bulgatti/CNET

The 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max have the exact same rear cameras, all with 48-megapixel sensors. Or you can choose between the trio of lenses (wide-angle, ultrawide and telephoto) to capture photos at 12-megapixel, 24-megapixel or 48-megapixel resolutions.

Here are some of my favorite photos from the 17 Pro Max:

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I snagged this shot of the Golden Gate Bridge with the iPhone 17 Pro Max's telephoto camera at 8x magnification.

Patrick Holland/CNET

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In this image from the 17 Pro Max's main camera, CNET's Jesse Orrall is filming video footage of the new iPhone Air.

Patrick Holland/CNET

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I grabbed this image of the front of a Zoox taxi with the 17 Pro Max's 4x telephoto camera.

Patrick Holland/CNET

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The 17 Pro Max's macro mode caught all the crumbs and textures from this avocado toast.

Patrick Holland/CNET

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The Roxie Theater in San Francisco and its neon sign, as captured at 2x magnification in night mode.

Patrick Holland/CNET

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Just three cool guys. I took this selfie with the new Center Stage camera that allows me to hold the 17 Pro Max vertically and still take a horizontal photo.

Patrick Holland/CNET

Telephoto cameras are the most challenging for phone-makers to get right because of how little room a phone has to spare for the required lens components. But seeing how much Apple improved the one on the 17 Pro and Pro Max is impressive. The telephoto camera has gone from the 16 Pro's 12-megapixel sensor with a 5x lens to a 48-megapixel sensor that's 56% larger with a new 4x telephoto lens.

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Both of these images of Dolores Park were taken at 4x magnification. The one on the left is from the iPhone 17 Pro Max and the other is from the iPhone 16 Pro.

Patrick Holland/CNET

You read that right: The new Pro has a shorter optical zoom than its predecessor. I thought I'd notice the difference between 4x and 5x, but unless I had the phones side-by-side, I was unaware. The 17 Pro Max's telephoto images are brighter and have better details and resolution than ones from the 16 Pro, which is likely the result of the larger sensor.

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Here is a photo of the Palace of Fine Arts taken at 1x with the 17 Pro Max's main camera.

Patrick Holland/CNET

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And here is a 4x zoom photo taken from the same spot as above.

Patrick Holland/CNET

And similar to the wizardry Apple uses to make 2x photos look good, the telephoto camera is able to achieve 8x images. Telephoto images at 4x taken under good lighting (like a nice sunny day) can stand toe-to-toe with images from the main camera. But when I took telephoto images in less than ideal lighting, the 4x images held up OK, whereas the 8x images had more noise and softness.

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On the left is a 4x image from the iPhone 17 Pro Max and on the right, an 8x photo.

Patrick Holland/CNET

There's a new selfie camera on both Pro phones that Apple calls Center Stage. It not only takes 18-megapixel selfies, up from 12 megapixels on the 16 Pro, but you can hold the 17 Pro vertically and take a horizontal selfie thanks to a new square image sensor. You can press an onscreen button to change the orientation, and there are even settings that will auto-rotate and auto-zoom out for group shots. Those automatic settings are hit or miss in practice and remind me of the auto-zoom feature on the Galaxy Z Flip 6 that worked but often had a seconds-long lag before zooming.

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It's just CNET's Abrar Al-Heeti and me taking some casual selfies with the new Center Stage camera.

Patrick Holland/CNET

There's also a new mode called Dual-capture, which allows you to record with the front and a back cameras at the same time. The selfie video shows up as a tiny picture-in-picture box, which you can move around the corners of the screen during the recording. The final video has the PIP window (and any movements) burnt into the file.

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Here is a still from a Dual Capture video I shot on the iPhone 17 Pro Max while enjoying some breakfast.

Patrick Holland/CNET

It's a nifty addition and I can see how-to TikTok creators embracing it. I just wish I could switch which camera was in the PIP between the selfie camera and a rear camera. I'd also like to see a 50/50 onscreen option, like the one found on the Galaxy S21 series and newer.

iOS 26 is the iPhone 17 Pro Max's soul

The iPhone 17 Pro Max and iOS 26 are like peanut butter and jelly. One of my favorite things is being able to add a background image to group threads in Messages.

Patrick Holland/CNET

Apple's iOS 26 animations have seemingly comic book character abilities. Every time I unlock my phone, the apps delightfully assemble on the home screen like the five lion robots uniting together to become Voltron. The lock screen clock extends around my chosen photo like Mr. Fantastic. The control center pulls down as if I were stretching a piece of taffy.

The unified look of the Liquid Glass interface across apps, the Home Screen and lock screen give the iPhone a contemporary, slick and shiny, plastic candy feel. For all the beauty Liquid Glass adds, though, some of the warmth of previous iOS versions is gone.

There are small but significant gems buried in iOS 26's design, including the ability to add a background image to group chats in Messages or use the new Hold Assist tool for phone calls.

Visual Intelligence now lets you use a screenshot for a Google Images search or prompt for ChatGPT.

Patrick Holland/CNET

Visual Intelligence for screenshots is a killer feature. I can easily search or use the image for a prompt in ChatGPT. Being able to scribble over just a portion of an image is handy for narrowing what Google searches for or what ChatGPT sees. Having to take a screenshot of what's on the display feels like an extra step versus just being able to long press a button and circle what you want to search, though.

Live Translation is a nice addition, especially since it works for text messages, phone calls and FaceTime calls.

Celso Bulgatti/CNET

There are new Live Translations for messages, phone calls and FaceTime calls. Translations were accurate for Spanish but did have some issues with Portuguese. The couple of times I tried it, the person on the other end would be thrown off by the translation voice, which would sometimes overlap with what I or they were saying.

In FaceTime calls, having the translated live captions helped keep the call feeling natural since there wasn't a "third" voice making the translations. Instead, the translation would show up as captions as if I was watching a movie with closed captioning.

iPhone 17 Pro Max final thoughts

Look at the shadow cast from the 17 Pro Max's camera plateau.

Patrick Holland/CNET

One thing that I appreciate is that Apple gave the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max personality. Gone is the minimal design for the sake of being simple. Now, we have an old punk rocker who put on a black leather jacket for the first time in years.

This redesign will not appeal to everyone. But ultimately, whether you upgrade to the iPhone 17 Pro or Pro Max comes down to many of the similar considerations of prior Pro models. Is your current phone on its last legs? Can you get a great deal on the new Pro iPhones? And will the battery get through a day for you? Even if you don't choose a 17 Pro in the highly visible orange option, getting a phone that solves those problems is punk, too.

How we test phones

Every phone CNET's reviews team tests is used in the real world. We test a phone's features, play games and take photos. We examine the display to see if it's bright, sharp and vibrant. We analyze the design and build to see how it is to hold and whether it has an IP rating for water resistance. We push the processor's performance to the extremes using standardized benchmark tools like GeekBench and 3DMark, along with our own anecdotal observations navigating the interface, recording high-resolution videos and playing graphically intense games at high refresh rates.

All the cameras are tested in a variety of conditions, from bright sunlight to dark indoor enviornments. We try out special features like night mode and portrait mode, and compare our findings against similarly priced competing phones. We also check out the battery life by using it daily, as well as running a series of battery drain tests.

We take into account additional features like support for 5G, satellite connectivity, fingerprint and face sensors, stylus support, fast charging speeds and foldable displays, among others that can be useful. We balance all of this against the price to give you the verdict on whether the phone, whatever price it is, actually represents good value. While these tests may not always be reflected in CNET's initial review, we conduct follow-up and long-term testing in most circumstances.