Apple’s Glowtime event was an absolute doozy. Not only did Apple reveal the hotly anticipated iPhone 16 collection, but it lifted the lid on the redesigned Apple Watch Series 10 and a whole host of minor, but meaningful, updates to the entire AirPods collection.
However, a few products were tipped to launch alongside the latest iPhone collection that didn’t materialise, including the Apple Watch Ultra 3 and a replacement for Apple’s controversial finewoven iPhone case collection.
With that in mind, here’s everything that Apple didn’t announce at yesterday’s launch event.
The Apple Watch Ultra 3
The Apple Watch Ultra initially appeared in September 2022, and the Apple Watch Ultra 2 made an appearance at last year’s September event, so it was pretty safe to assume that the Apple Watch Ultra 3 would make its debut at this year’s September event.
Even Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, an analyst who’s usually pretty on the money with Apple-related predictions, claimed as recently as three days before the event that “the company is preparing to update all of its Apple Watch models at once. There will be a new low-end Apple Watch SE, a mid-level Series 10 model and an Ultra 3.”
It’s possible that the addition of the new black finish for the Apple Watch Ultra 2, alongside new software features like sleep apnea detection that were announced at yesterday’s event, could’ve been mistaken for a new product, as there wasn’t much on what the new Ultra smartwatch could offer ahead of its supposed launch.
With the new black colour option and software features for the Apple Watch Ultra 2, Apple likely won’t reveal the Apple Watch Ultra 3 until next September.
A cheaper Apple Watch SE
For the past few months, rumours have been swirling around the internet about the supposed third-generation Apple Watch SE and how it could be even cheaper this time around.
The rumour came from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, who claimed in July 2024 that the Apple Watch SE could be made from a new material – plastic. “One idea that the company has tested is swapping out the aluminum shell in favor of rigid plastic,” Gurman claimed in his Power On newsletter.
Per the analyst, this could allow Apple to drop the price of the Apple Watch SE “to something that could better rival Samsung’s cheapest watch, the $199 Galaxy Watch FE.”
And, as with the Apple Watch Ultra 3, Gurman claimed as recently as last Friday that the Apple Watch SE 3 was indeed on track for a September launch, before claiming just ahead of the event that the SE 3 had been delayed.
It’s possible that Apple is planning on releasing the updated Apple Watch SE alongside a new iPhone SE sometime in 2025, but it’s hard to say for sure at this stage.
New Apple Watch band system
Way back in August 2023, before the Apple Watch Series 9 was announced, there were rumours doing the rounds online that suggested that the Apple Watch Series 10 – which was announced at this week’s event – would sport an entirely new band system that’d make older watch straps obsolete.
Individuals apparently involved in developing new models of Apple Watch told Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman that the existing band system takes up too much space, space that could be better used for bigger batteries or other tech that’d improve the Apple Watch experience.
As such, the company was considering a magnetic band attachment system – though even at that stage, it wasn’t a given that it’d actually appear on the then-dubbed Apple Watch X.
Months later, in December 2023, Apple leaker and prototype collector Kosutami also claimed that the next generation of Apple Watch would feature a redesign that’d render existing Watch bands incompatible, adding further fuel to the flame.
We now know that wasn’t the case – for the Apple Watch Series 10, anyway. It’s always possible that Apple is still tinkering away with a magnetic alternative ahead of the Series 11 launch next year, but we’ll have to wait and see.
iPads
Apple’s iPad mini hasn’t had much attention since its last update in 2021, but rumours suggest that the company is hard at work on the next-gen model behind closed doors at Apple Park.
As well as updates that’d bring the iPad mini in line with the rest of the modern iPad collection – support for the Apple Pencil Pro, a landscape-orientated selfie camera and the like – the iPad Mini 7 could feature the same A18 chipset as the iPhone 16, along with a boosted 128GB of base storage to match the iPad Air.
Then there’s also a rumoured update to the entry-level iPad, the iPad 11. Not much is known about the tablet, but given that the iPad 10 was such a massive overhaul for the cheap iPad, not much will likely change. In fact, Mark Gurman claims that the company is working out “how to make its production costs lower on the entry-level model”.
The iPad Mini 6 was launched in September 2021, and although the iPad 10 was revealed in October 2022, most other entry-level iPads have launched in September, leading many to believe that they’d make an appearance this week.
However, new rumours claim that Apple could instead launch the new iPads alongside new models of Mac at a separate event in October.
New leather alternative to the Finewoven iPhone case
With the launch of the iPhone 15 range in 2023, Apple did away with a staple of the iPhone accessory collection; the leather case. In its place came the new Finewoven cases that Apple described as offering a durable micro-twill finish with a soft suede-like feel.
That sounds pretty nice, but the problem is that the cases deteriorated very quickly – as in, they’d look terrible within a few weeks of purchase.
Many assumed that Apple would kill off the Finewoven case collection with the iPhone 16 collection, and while that is true, the replacement isn’t a new leather case, instead cheaper Silicone and Plastic cases for the latest iPhones.
But hey, at least there are plenty of great third-party casemakers, right?
