Apple iPhone 17e and Google Pixel 10a: Are these phones really 'new' at all?

Key Highlights

• In an era where users are holding on to their phones longer, both companies seem to be releasing refreshed models that feel more like routine check-ins than revolutions. More from Tech How Iran’s Handala hackers are using Elon Musk’s Starlink for cyberattacks amid internet blackout Claude down: Anthropic’s chatbot outage impacting thousands of users on mobile and webAnd that begs the question, if nothing’s truly new, why launch them at all?Same design, same hardware, different yearBoth Apple and Google appear to be following the same playbook this year, polish what already works and repackage it as progress. The iPhone 17e is almost a mirror image of the iPhone 16e, sporting the same 6.1-inch Super Retina XDR display, 48MP Fusion camera, and 12MP front lens.
• The supposed star of the show, Apple’s new A19 chip, does little to change the experience compared to the A18 before it.
• Even Apple’s trademark “all-day battery life” claim feels like it’s been copied and pasted from the last press release. Google hasn’t done much better.
• The Pixel 10a continues the design language of the Pixel 9a, right down to its 6.3-inch Actua display and dual-camera array.
• It even runs on the same Tensor G4 processor, which Google boasted about just last year.