An iPhone 16 Pro teardown reveals significant internal changes. This includes a compact and denser motherboard and a metal-enclosed battery.
Surprisingly, the iPhone 16 Pro Max’s battery is still enclosed in black foil.
iPhone 16 Pro features a compact, denser motherboard
Soon after the iPhone 16’s announcement, Apple detailed making major internal changes to make its new iPhones more repair-friendly. This included changes to make battery replacements and component swaps easier. Now, a teardown from YouTuber REWA Technology gives us our first look at the iPhone 16 Pro internals.
Like previous iPhones, accessing the iPhone 16 Pro’s innards requires taking off the bottom screws and then removing the back glass. This reveals the battery covered in a shiny metal casing, which presumably helps with heat dissipation.
Other notable changes include a smaller front camera module and a smaller, denser motherboard. The latter’s layout is also significantly different, with a bigger heat chamber for better heat dissipation.
Unlike the iPhone 16 and 16 Plus, adhesive pads and not ionic liquid battery adhesive hold the iPhone 16 Pro’s metal-enclosed battery in place. So, you can’t loosen it by applying a low-voltage electrical current using a 9V battery. Instead, you must use the pull tabs as with previous iPhones.
The iPhone 16 Pro’s camera modules are larger. This is due to the new 5x tetraprism optical shooter, which is noticeably wider than the previous 3x sensor.
Why did Apple not cover the iPhone 16 Pro Max battery in a metal casing?
Apple uses a metal casing exclusively for the iPhone 16 Pro’s battery, with the iPhone 16 Pro Max’s battery enclosed in black foil.
This is likely because the latter has a bigger chassis and heat chamber. Since there’s more internal room, heat dissipation is not a big challenge, and Apple could get by without enclosing the iPhone 16 Pro Max’s battery in a metal casing.
