Predicting Apple

Predicting the details of Apple's product releases is fairly easy if you stick to broad generalisations: we can be fairly sure that the new iPhone (expected in the autumn) will be faster, about the same size and weight, have better wireless connectivity, an improved camera and about the same battery life. We're also likely to see, thanks to iOS 6 (previewing at WWDC?), improvements to key software elements, including Apple's stock applications, APIs and integration with 3rd-party systems. Improvements in all these areas would probably keep the iPhone ahead of the competition.

How can we be (reasonably) sure of this? Apple is secretive and doesnt discuss future releases but their general philosophy of incremental improvement is well known and can be used to make broad-brush predictions.

It's more difficult to spot the new things, the unexpected leaps into the unknown, like Siri or deep Twitter integration or the completely new chassis of the iPhone 4. Once we move beyond the incremental improvements we proceed by guesswork, guided only by Apple's patents and the unhelpful "intelligence" of various sources "close to Apple" or their manufacturing partners.

There are, however, a few rumours that we can probably discount:


Larger screen - the trend in Android devices has been toward ever larger screens with some "phones" now reaching a thumb-destroying five inches. The iPhone has had a 3.5" screen since launch and there are good ergonomic and product differentiation reasons for expecting this to continue.


More storage - it's normal for successive generations of computers to feature ever larger storage systems but in a mobile device with limited battery capacity this isn't always helpful. The fact that the new iPad, which arguably has a much greater need for storage capacity, has a top limit of 64Gb suggests the iPhone isn't likely to jump to 128Gb.


Quad-core processor - the iPhone 4S is already very fast. Adding extra cores might make it faster but it would also burn battery more quickly. Maybe next year.


Liquid metal chassis - sounds fantastic and I think it will happen at some point but probably not this year.


NFC - I'd love to see NFC in an iPhone so that I could dump my credit and Oyster cards but, based on nothing at all, I don't think it'll happen this year.
So what, apart from the incremental improvements mentioned above, do I predict for the next iPhone/iOS combination?

• Siri will be improved and extended, possibly with a third-party developer API and (more likely) access to many more databases (particularly outside the US where coverage is relatively poor).
• Enhanced gestures and interactions to simplify tasks that Siri can't handle.
• New mapping and navigation features, probably with reduced emphasis on Google Maps.
• Widgets and other improvements to the home and lock screens.
• Deeper integration with iCloud, Facebook, iPad and, hopefully, Mountain Lion.

Every previous prediction I've made about Apple's products has been wrong and I confidently expect to be wrong again. Check back after WWDC for an update.