Exclusive: Gurman on the iPhone 17 Slim and Apple’s next big move

In an exclusive interview, Apple reporter Mark Gurman shares his thoughts on the iPhone 17 and other upcoming Apple products.

After five years of releasing iPhones with only modest design updates, Apple is preparing to launch its slimmest-ever iPhone, dubbed the iPhone 17 Slim, in 2025.

According to Mark Gurman, who reports on Apple products based on his sources inside the company, the iPhone 17 Slim will sell well, but it will not be the smash hit that some expect it to be.

“Apple consumers have shown they want the highest-end, most expensive devices. And I think the Slim is a mid-tier device,” Gurman says.

In an exclusive interview with Cybernews, the reporter shares his insights on the upcoming Apple smart home device, what the company needs to make Vision Pro a success, and the potential next big hit for Apple under Tim Cook.

He also reveals what Apple needs to do to catch its competitors in the AI race and whether he trusts its products to be 100% secure.

Gurman, who started reporting on Apple when he was 15, has been working at Bloomberg for the past eight years, reporting on major company product launches.

We recently covered his reporting journey. Now, let’s examine his predictions and insights about Apple products.

iPhone 16 sales aren't that great compared to some of Apple's competitors. Is this because Apple intelligence features weren’t available at the launch, or were there other reasons?

iPhone 16 is selling well, and sales are stable, but obviously, they're not breaking any records here.

I think AI is still very nascent and that Apple's offerings in terms of AI are still quite limited. I don't think AI is a feature that sells phones.

What sells phones are improved cameras, new designs, and new displays. From that standpoint, the iPhone 16 was a very minor update.

You're going to see more momentum for the phone, more supercycle-like advances when they're making major changes, major design overhauls. And it's been five years since they did anything significant on the design.

Will the upcoming Apple foldable or the rumored Ultraslim iPhone be more successful?

I don’t think that the Slim is going to be a smash hit. Apple consumers have shown that they want the highest-end, most expensive devices. And I think the Slim is a mid-tier device.

It will do well, it will do better than the iPhone mini and the iPhone Plus combined, but I don't think it's going to be the mainstream hit that maybe some people expect it to be.

When you see a new design for the iPhone 17 Pro line, I think it will do quite well. I also think the iPhone SE with an in-house modem coming out in the spring of 2025 will do quite well because of its price point. Combined with that functionality, I think you're going to see a lot of upgrades spurred by it and a lot of switchers from Android.

The iPhone is in a place where it's an iconic product, and you've seen the momentum around its innovation slow down to almost a halt. But I definitely think that it still has a long future ahead of it, with foldables and the like.

In one of your newsletters, you mentioned that, according to your sources in Apple, the company considers itself two years behind in the AI race. How likely is Apple to catch up?

I just don't see how they catch up because where Apple is going to be in two years is where some of the AI companies were two years ago. I think they're in a very precarious position technology-wise. The only way to advance seriously would be to acquire a major AI provider.

Apple is in a different place to some other companies, and that's why it is positioning its AI differently. One, they're positioning it as a very integrated system rather than just a layer on top, like you're seeing from OpenAI and others. The other thing is they're positioning it as very privacy-forward, which is a big differentiator from the other players.

I think at some point, you'll see them acquire an AI provider to speed things up. They have acquired many small AI companies, but they haven't made a major, groundbreaking AI-related acquisition.

All major Apple products were launched under Steve Jobs. It seems that with Cook, the company has continued to capitalize on Jobs's ideas. How likely are we to see a successful Apple innovation under Cook?

Tim Cook is squeezing as much juice as possible out of the momentum that Steve Jobs left. When Jobs passed away you had 1 or 2 types of iPhones, one type of iPad, and a few Macs.

Now, there are multiple sizes of every type of Mac. You have half a dozen types of iPads and iPhones, three types of Apple pencils, and so on. I think Cook did the best job he could coming after Jobs. And it is remarkable how well Apple has done in the post-Steve Jobs era.

Certainly, Cook needs a product hit. Many people thought that it was going to be the Apple car that didn't come to fruition or the Apple Vision Pro. Obviously, that's not happening. I think the hit product is going to be an evolution of the Vision Pro, Apple Watch, or Apple Glasses type of experience.

You haven't mentioned smart home devices, including AI-powered communication home control, that Apple is reportedly planning to launch in 2025. So you don’t think they will be a big hit?

I think it's going to add more revenue to the bottom line and strengthen the overall Apple ecosystem. I think it's going to excite people who are fans of the Apple Home app and Apple HomeKit and sort of the new Thread and Matter standards, but I don't think it's going to be a runaway hit. I think it's going to be something that is late to market and not particularly game-changing or innovative.

But I'm excited about it. I think there's going to be a class of people who are buying multiple smart home displays for their homes. The big question is: Why can't you just use an iPad? So, we'll see what differentiates this device from an iPad. Why do you need both? That's the story that Apple's going to have to tell.

Apple Vision Pro hasn’t yet become a mainstream hit, as some expected it would. Is there a future for such a device? After Meta teased Orion, some say that augmented reality (AR) glasses may be the future of computing.

I think Vision Pro has a future, but it is not the product it is today. If they can cut the price down from $1500 to $2000 and the weight down by a third or 50%, you’d have an extraordinarily intriguing product that everyone is going to want.

Apple will eventually reach that point. The question is, how long will it take? And will they be able to do so quickly enough before the interest in the product fades away?

The ultimate vision here is that people will have both types of devices. Just like today, we have laptops and tablets – you're going to see a case where someone would have Vision Pro and use it at home and for work purposes, but maybe they would also have AR glasses.

I think in terms of mainstream, the AR glasses are going to be what really takes this mixed reality category to a new level. If Apple gets the price right and the battery life right, you're going to see pretty good adoption.

When Apple is finally able to release its own AR glasses, they're going to be in good shape, but it's going to take a while, and they're going to be pricey, at least initially. But I do believe long-term in the category is just about getting there.

Do you remember when exactly Apple became a privacy-oriented company? How did this decision play out over time?

I think Jobs and Cook really cared about Apple's privacy push from the beginning. In the early days of the App Store, when they were talking about different applications and third-party applications, getting access to your data and privacy became very important.

But I would say it was about 8-10 years ago when they really started pushing it. I think one component of it was in response to why Siri is not as powerful as some of the other AI assistants, and I think that the privacy standards that they needed to set internally for one reason for that.

Apple wants people to know that one of the reasons Siri was a bit behind was the strict privacy requirements. So, I think that was one big component of it.

I think there was an FBI case related to a shooting in California in 2015 and 2016. Apple really took a stand for privacy around that time.

It's really core to their marketing at this point, where they're trying to differentiate themselves from other products by saying this is the safer product to store data.

Do you trust Apple devices to be completely secure?

You can never trust that a device is 100% secure. You always have to take extra precautions regarding two-factor authentication, password management, and other security measures.

Staying vigilant no matter what and putting 100% trust in these devices to protect you the way they're marketed to protect you would be a mistake and a fool's errand.