The pros at iFixIt have pried apart Apple’s latest-model phone to learn its secrets, and it seems that the theme of the Apple iPhone 13 Pro is one of parts consolidation from the previous generation.
And those components are impressive from the specs alone. Consider the parts list that includes:
- Apple A15 Bionic System on a Chip with 5-core GPU, 6-core CPU, and 16-core Neural Engine
- 6.1-inch Super Retina XDR OLED display with ProMotion
- 12-megapixel triple camera system with ultra-wide angle, wide angle, and telephoto lenses and a lidar module
- 6 GB of RAM and as much as 1 TB of storage
- Sub-6 GHz 5G, mmWave (on U.S. models), 4x4 MIMO LTE, 2x2 MIMO 802.11ax Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, Ultra Wideband, and NFC communications
- MagSafe 15W wireless charging
Packing all these goodies into a slim phone is the challenge, so iFixIt experts pried off the iPhone 13 Pro’s display to see how Apple’s engineers did it. Once the lid was off, the technician was surprised to see how clearly labeled all the parts are, as if Apple had anticipated this phone’s starring role in the video!
We can also see that the digitizer and display cables have been combined and that the upper sensor cable is very thin and short.
There was concern that Apple might have made the iPhone 13 Pro’s 11.97 Wh battery non-replaceable, but the iFixIt teardown confirmed that it can still be swapped as on other models.
What will not be replaceable, at least not by anyone other than Apple’s own authorized repair people, is the front-facing camera with its Face ID hardware. Because this is related to the security of what’s in the phone, the part is apparently serial-locked to the phone, and removing it disables Face ID.
The camera array is also another example of component integration on the iPhone 13 Pro, as Apple has integrated the flood illuminator into it along with the dot projector.
For all the real details, watch the video and check out iFixIt’s complete breakdown of the teardown job on their site.