A new model in Apple’s budget-friendly iPhone SE line, the iPhone SE 4, is expected to land later this year, and leaks are already teasing key design details – and the latest reports suggest that the SE 4 will miss out on the Dynamic Island, but could get the Action Button.
Starting with the bad news, rumors had suggested that the iPhone SE 4 would feature the Dynamic Island, which users of all iPhone 15 and 16 handsets, and the iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max, have been enjoying (or not, as the case is for our editor-at-large Lance Ulanoff).
However, that now doesn’t seem set to be the case. We reported a couple of days ago that a new leaked video had teased the return of the notch on the upcoming SE, and now display analyst Ross Young has claimed on social media that the notch is indeed returning.
The Dynamic Island reports came from another usually reliable leaker in Evan Blass, and these more trustworthy tipsters typically don’t contradict each other – especially not in the run-up to an expected product launch. However a third leaker – who goes by Majin Bu online – has explained that the confusion comes from Apple testing an SE 4 with a Dynamic Island during development before ultimately settling on the notch.
Push the button
Bu has also been sharing images and video said to show the iPhone SE 4, and in his most recent post on X he claims the phone will get an upgrade from a 4.7-inch screen to a 6.06-inch 60Hz OLED display (so with the notch it should look a lot like the iPhone 14), and the Action Button.
Having debuted on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max before making its way to all the iPhone 16 models, the Action Button is a programmable button which replaces the silence mode switch the featured on older models.
You can still use it to silence your phone in a hurry, but if you leave your iPhone’s ringer off anyway you can change the button to instead let you access other tools like your camera or torch – and using shortcuts you can even make the button do multiple different things based on how and when you use it.
As with all leaks we should take these notch and Action Button reports with a pinch of salt. We’ve already seen the leaked design of the iPhone SE 4 change, so there’s always a chance that it’ll change again before Apple makes the device official.
That said, based on everything we’ve seen and heard, the iPhone SE 4 is shaping up to be a solid smartphone with the same A18 chip found in the iPhone 16 and 8GB of RAM – both of which suggest Apple Intelligence support.
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