- The iPhone 18 could be in line for a RAM upgrade
- It might get 12GB of RAM to match the other iPhones
- More RAM means better support for AI features
Out of the four iPhones that Apple launched last month, the iPhone 17 stands alone in having 8GB of RAM – all the others have 12GB. According to a new rumor, that’s going to change with the iPhone 18 next year.
This comes from South Korean outlet The Bell (via MacRumors), and the report suggests that Apple’s regular RAM supplier Samsung has been asked to increase the number of modules available for the 2026 production runs.
A bump of an extra 50% is a hefty RAM increase for the iPhone 18, but it makes sense that Apple wants to upgrade this feature: we know that AI needs as much memory space as it can get, and no doubt we’ll get more Apple Intelligence improvements next year.
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Apple’s iPhones still lag behind Android phones overall when it comes to RAM – the Samsung Galaxy S25 has 12GB of RAM, for example – but can often compensate through the power of their mobile chipsets and their software optimizations.
Recent RAM upgrades
The iPhone 17 Pro comes with 12GB of RAM (Image credit: Lance Ulanoff / Future)
The base iPhone has been fitted with 8GB of RAM since the iPhone 16 launched in 2024, and before that the iPhone 15 got by with 6GB – which is why Apple Intelligence only works on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max from that series of handsets.
All the iPhone 16 models have 8GB of RAM, so it was only this year when the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max made the jump to 12GB. The iPhone Air also runs on 12GB of RAM, and shares the same A19 Pro chip as the Pro models (the iPhone 17 uses the standard A19).
This has a knock-on effect on performance and pricing as well of course, so it’s going to be interesting to see how Apple decides to differentiate between the various iPhone 18 handsets, if this key spec is the same across all of them.
We’ve not heard too much in the way of rumors and leaks so far around the iPhone 18, though there has been talk of full 5G satellite connectivity, and there might also be a substantial camera upgrade for the Pro and Pro Max models.
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