The iPhone 16 Pro Max is the newest, largest and pro-est iPhone you can buy today. But last year's iPhone 15 Pro Max remains a capable phone, so deciding if you need to upgrade, or if you might be better off buying the older model, isn't as straightforward as it seems.
We loved the iPhone 15 Pro Max when it first launched, thanks to its altered design with a titanium frame and Action button control, the most powerful zoom camera on an iPhone to date, and brilliant performance and power efficiency. But now the iPhone 16 Pro Max has arrived to change things up with a bigger screen, a fresh Camera Control button, upgraded photo and video abilities and the expected annual upgrades to the chipset and battery.
This article will walk you through all the key differences between the iPhone 16 Pro Max and iPhone 15 Pro Max.
iPhone 16 Pro Max vs iPhone 15 Pro Max: A bigger screen than ever, with a smaller Dynamic Island
The iPhone 15 Pro Max is already pretty large at 6.7 inches, but the iPhone 16 Pro Max is even larger at 6.9 inches. Both screens are still OLED units with Apple's signature Dynamic Island cutouts near the top for the Face ID and front camera module, an adaptive 1-120Hz refresh rate and have a maximum listed brightness of 2,000 nits.
Our testing data shows that the neither the iPhone 16 Pro Max or 15 Pro Max reach the 2,000 nits Apple promised. Instead they're both pretty similar, with a respective 1,553 and 1,550 nits of HDR brightness. Interestingly the 16 Pro Max reproduced just 80.4% of the DCI-P3 color space, 4.1% less than the iPhone 15 Pro Max. Likewise the higher Delta-E score means that its colors are slightly less accurate.
Why this might be isn't clear, though the changes to the display may have something to do with the variance between the two.
iPhone 16 Pro Max vs iPhone 15 Pro Max: A brand-new button
The Camera Control is one of the big new upgrades to the iPhone 16 series, Pro Max included. It's a capacitive/physical button that makes it easy to access the camera and make adjustments to your image with simple swipes.
Later, this control will also be the way to access Visual Intelligence, another new feature. This is currently only available as part of the iOS 18.2 beta — but the stable version of iOS 18.2 is scheduled to be released to the masses in December.
Visual Intelligence gives the user quick access to information on what you have in front of your iPhone's cameras, like the breed of a passing dog or the opening hours of a restaurant you've come across.
iPhone 16 Pro Max vs iPhone 15 Pro Max: Even stronger battery life
With a battery life of over 14 hours, according to our custom battery life testing, the iPhone 15 Pro Max could offer a lot of usage time on a single charge. But as rival phones improved their own battery lives, last year's flagship iPhone slowly started dropping off our best battery life list.
Good thing that the iPhone 16 Pro Max absolutely trounces its predecessor in this category. We recorded a battery life of over 17 and a half hours, and we were to surprised by the results that we ran all the testing multiple times.
Not just that, but the iPhone 16 Pro Max also charges faster, despite having a larger battery. After 15 minutes the phone had gone from 0 to 29%, compared to the iPhone 15 Pro Max's 20%. After half an hour that number had risen to 56% on the iPhone 16 Pro Max, while the iPhone 15 Pro Max was left at 41%
iPhone 16 Pro Max vs iPhone 15 Pro Max: More power across the board
Apple upgraded the A17 Pro chipset in the iPhone 15 Pro Max for an A18 Pro in the iPhone 16 Pro Max. The upgraded silicon brings with it more power and greater efficiency across the board. Particular areas of focus for Apple were its improved AI abilities, faster image processing with the camera and speedier graphics.
Cooling this high-performance chip is a new graphite and aluminium sub-structure inside the phone. With lots of complaints about the iPhone 15 Pro Max revolving around how hot it got during heavy workloads, hopefully this new design will help spread that heat out more to make the phone comfortable to hold even while running demanding apps and games.
iPhone 16 Pro Max vs iPhone 15 Pro Max: Big camera enhancements
Apple has changed out the iPhone 15 Pro Max's 48MP main camera sensor for an upgraded version in the iPhone 16 Pro Max, which has unlocked 4K @ 120fps video recording for sharp but smooth clips. The ultrawide camera meanwhile has ditched the 12MP sensor seen in the 15 Pro Max and older iPhones and is now a 48MP resolution camera too on the 16 Pro Max.
There have been no changes to the selfie or 5x telephoto cameras, but adding up the two cameras that have changed and the Camera Control means there are still a number of differences between these two generations of Pro Max.
iPhone 16 Pro Max vs iPhone 15 Pro Max: Outlook
We're still waiting to bring your our full thoughts on the iPhone 16 Pro Max, and how it compares to the iPhone 15 Pro Max, but as it stands, there are some obvious advantages to going for the newer phone.
Anyone wanting the most power possible, the greatest camera hardware of any iPhone and the most expansive display Apple's put on a phone yet should look at the iPhone 16 Pro Max first. But the overall gap between the 16 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Pro Max isn't that large. And if you can find the iPhone 15 Pro Max at a discount where it's still on sale, it may arguably be the better value phone.
