Apple's first iPhone with homegrown 5G could be here by spring

Everyone who’s anyone in mobile tech is making their own chips: Google, Samsung, Apple. And while heavyweights like them love building phones around their own custom processors, giving these companies intimate control over feature sets, power consumption, and more, not everything’s so easy to do yourself. Even as Apple got very good at designing processors, it struggled to pivot that expertise into making its own 5G modems. We’ve long been wondering when iPhones would be ready to take that next step, and a new report suggests it could start happening next year.

We’ve been hearing a lot from noted industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo today, and that trend continues now, putting forward the theory that the first two iPhone models with Apple-made 5G modems will debut in 2025.

Rather than going all-in on these nascent 5G modems, Apple would reportedly ease itself through the transition, only starting with a portion of its 2025 lineup. That could start with the iPhone SE 4 in Q1, which would align with what we’ve heard about a launch happening as soon as March.

Later in the year, we expect Apple to introduce the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max — and based on Kuo’s information, those three (notably, the most mainstream) iPhones would stick with Qualcomm radios, at least for this generation. But we’re also anticipating an iPhone 17 “Slim” that could be a marked departure from the company’s past designs — and with a premium price, to match. And just like the iPhone 4 SE, Kuo claims that Apple is planning to use its own in-house 5G modem here.

That approach sounds pretty reasonable, especially when you’re testing the waters for a big move like this. The early-year SE launch would give Apple a small buffer to resolve issues ahead of the year’s main pack of new iPhones, and staying away from the most popular models there could afford Apple a little wiggle room if things don’t go great.