One of the biggest news stories of the past week was a potential date for the next iPhone announcement, provided by the fairly trustworthy All Things D. According to them, Apple will unveil the next iPhone – or iPhones – on September 10th.

If Apple releases the new iPhone in the same way as the iPhone 5, that’d mean we’d get news of the event on September 4th, the event on the 10th, see pre-orders start on September 12th and the actual release date to be a week later, on September 19th.

So, what do we know about the next iPhone? Probably the biggest thing to note is that it seems likely we’ll see two iPhone models for the first time – the normal evolutionary iPhone 5S and a completely new model, the iPhone 5C. Let’s have a look at each of these now.

iPhone 5S

The iPhone 5S is expected to be the same dimensions as the iPhone 5, with a couple of key differences inside and out.

The camera is an area of constant iteration for Apple, and we’d be surprised to see no changes here. The sensor resolution is expected to jump from 8 to 12 megapixels, and we’re also anticipating a new dual LED flash.

One slightly more novel rumoured feature is a fingerprint scanner, which should make the new iPhone more secure. It’s not known whether this would be integrated into the display – allowing for an authenticated slide-to-unlock gesture – or into the home button.

One of the most interesting rumours is that we’ll see an IGZO (indium gallium zinc oxide) display, which would use less battery and be brighter.

Finally, the hardware inside the phone is expected to be upgraded as is customary with an ‘S’ release. Here we’re expecting a faster A6 quad-core chip, 2 GB of RAM (which would be an Apple first) and a more capacious battery.

It’s not yet known whether iPhone 5S cases will be identical to iPhone 5 cases – it’s possible that the convex fingerprint scanner and the dual LED flash may necessitate differently shaped cases with new cutouts.

iPhone 5C

The iPhone 5C is a new model, whose biggest selling point is its lower cost than a traditional iPhone model.

The new phone will have an all-plastic design which should cost Apple less to manufacture, along with less powerful internals – probably around the specification of the iPhone 4. The case will be available in multiple colours, similar to Apple’s line of iPods. It’s these colour options that give the iPhone 5C its name.

As the iPhone 5C is a new design for Apple, there’ll be a new range of iPhone 5C accessories, including cases, covers, car holders and the like.

Conclusion

So there we have it – all we know about the upcoming iPhones. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to leave them below. Thanks for reading the article and have a great day!