iPhone 16 Camera Control button: the most un-Apple Apple thing ever

Apple’s iPhone 16 series caught us off guard with a couple of things, specifically surrounding the Camera Control button. By this point, the joke that “Apple does not add buttons” has been driven to the ground, but there’s a reason for that — it’s been true for a while.

Just a few years ago, we were looking at concepts and listening to rumors about Apple thinking about a buttonless, portless iPhone. And, while they sound slightly absurd, they were pretty easy to believe because Apple has a history of removing “simple” hardware and over-engineering solutions, which arguably nobody asked for. In fact, I still believe that engineers at Cupertino were having very serious brainstorming sessions, and maybe projects on the subject of a buttonless iPhone.

But the past two iPhone generations graced us with quite the opposite.



Last year, we got a new Action Button. Now, it wasn’t too far out of the ordinary, as it replaced the mechanical Mute toggle and enhanced it to be programmable. It had the drawbacks of only being able to do one thing (and look good doing it, with fancy animations), and being exclusive to the Pro models.