The third-generation iPhone SE was released in 2022, a lifetime ago in the tech world. So Apple’s “budget” smartphone is due for an update, and it looks like we just might get it… today.
“Get ready to meet the newest member of the family,” Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote last week in an X post that teased a product launch on February 19. An accompanying six-second video features a moving, reflective Apple logo set to tstewart/Machinedrum’s “elysian walk, pt. 1.”
As PCMag reports, Cook’s tweet didn’t give away any other solid clues, but Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman posted last week that a “new iPhone SE is still imminent and should be announced by next week.” He followed that up with another tweet that said: “Tim Cook teases the new iPhone SE.”
Some questioned whether the circular, silver item in Cook’s teaser is a new AirTag. But while “there is a new [AirTag] coming this year,” Gurman says, “Tim isn’t going to put out a teaser for a new $29 accessory. He would for a major new low end iPhone though.”
In late January, tipster Majin Bu posted a video on X of what he stated is the iPhone SE 4. There was one camera, which The Verge’s Chris Welch suggested would “explain the [Cook video’s] circle to me if people insist on reading into it.” Gurman responded with two bell emojis, as in “ding! ding! you are correct.”
Leaks about the iPhone SE 4, meanwhile, tip USB-C connectivity, Apple Intelligence, and an OLED display that’s larger than the previous generation. According to CNET, the iPhone SE will likely adopt the iPhone 14’s design, meaning no more home button, Touch ID, and massive upper and lower bezels. The prior generation iPhone SE retailed for $429 at launch and the new generation should be in the same neighborhood.
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