I’ve worked at MobileSyrup for the past eight years, and because of my love of smartphones, I’m always curious to see what phone someone is using. Some folks ‘people-watch,’ but when I’m on the subway, I ‘phone-watch’ to see what handsets are popular.
I’ve been seeing more Pixels and some Samsung flip phones on the street, which is exciting, but most commonly it’s still iPhones and various Samsungs.
Even though I see them all the time, I sometimes struggle to tell which iPhone is which. Despite working at MobileSyrup, I can’t remember all the iPhone’s niche model changes. I know if it has big bezels and a button, it’s old, if there’s a notch, it’s old, but not as old, and if there’s a Dynamic Island, it’s newer.
However, the new iPhone 17 Pro in Cosmic Orange looks so unique, it’s simply iconic. Its bright colour and large camera bump, which has changed the way iPhone cases look, make it easy to spot. Even other colours of the 17 Pro are pretty easy to tell apart from the older models because of the new camera design.
This could be a bad or good thing, but either way, it makes the iPhone 17 Pro, soooo noticeable. From the second I see the hard-to-miss orange, I know what phone it is. Literally, while a subway was passing me (I missed the doors by a second), I saw a man whiz by holding his bright orange iPhone 17 Pro—it’s crazy.
In addition to the flaming hot orange, the camera bump is weird, and the duotone of the aluminum frame against the pale ceramic shield backing is a little strange. I’m not even sure if I like it; however, it all works together to accentuate the phone’s individuality, and as I’ve been saying, makes it an icon.
Rumour has it that Samsung’s Galaxy S26 might be using a similar orange colour as the 17 Pro, but even with that colouring, the iPhone’s odd rear design will continue to make it stand out. Samsung might be using pretty much the same design as previous years, with just a new coat of paint. To take that a bit further, I’m not sure if the orange trend will feel as unique in a few months.
I’m not someone who normally has FOMO, but at the Snapdragon Summit a few weeks ago, most of the tech reviewers had this Cosmic Orange iPhone, and I felt a little like I was missing out.
Of course, there are other striking phones like the Nothing Phone 3, Pixel 9a, and the iPhone Air; however, out of everything readily available in Canada this year, the 17 Pro takes the cake. (This means I didn’t count phones from Xiaomi, Vivo, and other brands as they don’t launch in the North.)
Seriously though, a phone this hard-to-miss is absolutely great marketing for Apple, and the company should continue to make design changes in fun colours in the future. Maybe they’ll even bring back mid-cycle colour refreshes like they did with the 13 series. Because, I’ve never been so excited to get an iPhone, and I imagine that a lot of other people feel the same way. Who would have thought the best new feature this year is the colour.
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