Ken Segall:
Every September, I eagerly await the unveiling of the new iPhones. I also feel a sense of dread, wondering what Apple is going to call them. That’s because, when it comes to iPhone naming, Apple seems to wage a war against common sense.
Last year’s models set new standards for complexity. We had an 8, 8 Plus, X and SE. That’s two numbers, one Roman numeral, one paring of letters, plus an odd numerical gap between 8 and 10. Or, in Apple lingo, between 8 and X.
It’s hard to imagine how a family of only four products could end up with such needlessly complicated names—especially coming from the company that wrote the book on simplicity.
So how do the iPhone names look in 2018?
I’m with Segall on this one. I think Apple may have painted themselves into a naming corner. I tend to refer to the new phones simply as “the S”, “the Max”, and “the R”. Still awkward though.
They don’t seem to have this issue with their computer line; it’s just MacBooks and iMacs, no matter when you buy them.
I guess since the phones are a more trendy product, each one needs to have a distinct name just to make it stand out from the others, and “2018 iPhone Plus” isn’t sexy enough.
I think half the problem stems from the fact that they went with “X” instead of “10”. It’s going to make it really hard to move on to “11” or “XI” if macOS is any indication.
The X was obviously an attempt to echo the drastic change from Classic in Mac OS.
For those of us who remember Extension Manager et al. skipping 9 wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
But yes, they may have painted themselves right into a corner. I’d suggest they take a page from the current Mac lineup and just use iPhone, iPhone Plus, and maybe iPhone SE. For every release.
They used to: Macintosh, Macintosh 512K, Macintosh Plus, Macintosh SE, Macintosh SE/30, Macintosh classic…
They got it right with the watch: Apple Watch series X…
I agree with Segall. The naming conventions are needlessly abstruse.
It’s like luxury cars XC90, Q5, 550e and so one.
I don’t care that much about the names but I don’t understand the move from Plus to Max. It’s not like there’s a Xs, Xs Plus AND Xs Max with the Max needed because it’s even bigger than a Plus. There’s just the normal size and the bigger size for which [name] and [name] Plus has always worked.
They should have just use Xs, Xs Plus, Xr. I get the need for Xr or something else that differentiates that phone since it’s actually a new product slot.
Seems to me that relatively few of the prospective customers for any iPhone would have any idea about what “Classic” was. You’re describing a tiny demographic of older enthusiasts.
The current laptops can be said to have this issue, too. The lightest, most minimal MacBook used to be the Air. But wait!
Many of Apple’s phone support people call it X not 10. Not sure what they want. I think whoever was in charge of iPad naming somehow got the gig here as well.
What a load of needless quibbling over naming!
maybe they were annoyed that samsung copied using the Plus nomenclature and wanted something different.
yeah it’s kind of weird. change next year?