Following Apple's "Surprise and Shine" event, I got a chance to briefly try out the iPhone 18 Pro. The new iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max weren't minor upgrades. Even though the physical dimensions remained the same, the internals got a significant boost this time around.

In what would previously be called an "s" year, Apple focused a lot on performance, cameras, and battery life. I couldn't test all of that in my limited time, but the cameras had me impressed. Before we get into that, let's take a look at some of the other enhancements. iPhone 18 Pro colors The new iPhone 18 Pro comes in four colors.

You've got Glacier, burgundy, silver, and black. With the iPhone 17 Pro, black was seemingly the most sought-after color. There were a lot of users who opined the lack of a black or dark grey phone, since it was only available in Cosmic Orange, Deep Blue, and silver. iPhone 18 Pro now comes in black The new black looks great and is a true black.

Especially with the black glass embedded in the back. I love the look of the new silver too. Apple says it is now "more refined," which appears to refer to the matching glass.

The iPhone 17 Pro has white glass embedded into the back of the silver phone, but the iPhone 18 Pro has silver glass. It looks more seamless and the Apple logo is more pronounced. The glacier blue iPhone 18 Pro I'm going to miss the Cosmic Orange.

I was glad to see the Glacier blue was more vivid than I anticipated. iPhone 18 Pro internal upgrades Internally, Apple has put in a new A20 Pro processor that has two new super cores, a larger and more powerful GPU, and twice the neural cores. There is also a second-generation vapor chamber that is larger and more efficient at cooling the phone. The new burgundy iPhone 18 Pro The new phone charges faster when using a wired power adapter and the smaller of the two pro phones has Apple's C2 modem with mm Wave support.

And that's on top of both phones having longer battery life. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to test any of that in my time with the new devices. They'll have to wait for the full review. iPhone 18 Pro cameras There was a ton new with the iPhone 18 Pro cameras.

The biggest change is a new variable aperture on the primary wide-angle camera. Aperture controls how much light hits the sensor. A wider aperture, noted with a smaller value, produces more background bokeh.

The iPhone 18 Pro features a variable aperture main camera. The bottom lens is open in the left photo, and more closed in the right photo. When you increase the aperture, you restrict how much light hits the sensor.

This will reduce background bokeh and make sure more of the photo is in focus. As a photographer, I was (and still am to be honest) a bit skeptical. With such a small sensor, I wasn't sure how well this would translate to meaningful bokeh and depth of field in a smartphone photo.

A photo of iPhone Duo testing out the variable aperture of iPhone 18 Pro. The left had an aperture of f/1.48 while the right had an aperture of f/4.0 I was pleasantly surprise...