The iPhone 17 Air is going to be the next big smartphone experiment at Apple. With a rumored thickness of just 5.5 millimeters and a high-density battery, it’s going to be the showcase of multiple innovations later this year. But Apple’s plans for slimmer phones down the road sound even more ambitious.
According to Bloomberg, Apple is planning to make a phone so slim that it will lack any physical port whatsoever. In fact, the company explored the idea for the iPhone 17 Air, but decided to wait out on those plans for a variety of reasons.
“An even bigger idea was to make the Air device Apple’s first completely port-free iPhone, one that omits that charging inlet as well as physical SIM tray. That would mean losing the USB-C connector and going all-in on wireless charging and syncing data with the cloud,” says the report.
One of the reasons Apple killed the port-less design idea for the iPhone 17 Air was regulatory headache, especially in the EU bloc. Apple was the last major brand to offer a proprietary port on its smartphones, before finally switching to a USB-C interface on the iPhone 15 series.
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The absence of a port would mean the iPhone 17 Air had to rely solely on the MagSafe wireless charging system. Moreover, the data storage duties would be tightly integrated with the iCloud system, since there is no hardware route for extracting or transferring data via cable.
It would have been a cumbersome move for an average buyer, especially from a repairability perspective. However, Apple is apparently serious about the whole idea. As per the Bloomberg report, if the iPhone 17 Air proves to be a success, Apple might again explore the idea of creating a port-free smartphone.
Apple won’t be the first
Apple won’t be the first to attempt that moonshot. Back in 2019, Chinese smartphone giant Vivo showcased the Apex concept. It was a device that lacked a USB port, SIM tray, buttons, or even speakers. In fact, the entire screen doubled as one massive fingerprint sensor on this one.
The same year, fellow Chinese brand Meizu revealed the Zero concept. It was a high-end phone idea without a charging port or a headphone jack. The company put the phone up for crowdfunding but failed to hit its financial backing goal.
Meizu later confirmed that the Zero was never intended as a mass-market device. But it seems 2025 will see a return to truly minimalist smartphone designs. The likes of Samsung, Honor, and Oppo are reportedly working on their own ultra-slim phones.
Tecno also wowed the crowd at MWC 2025 with a working sample of the Spark Slim smartphone. Xiaomi is also reportedly working on a phone that will lack any physical button whatsoever, but so far, the brand has remained mum on any such plans.
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