iPhone 18 Pro hits store shelves today with Apple’s first 2nm chip

Apple’s iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are available in stores and arriving at customers’ doors today, September 18, nine days after the company unveiled them at its “Surprise and shine” event — the first major product launch under new CEO John Ternus, who officially succeeded Tim Cook on September 1.

The headline upgrade is the A20 Pro chip, Apple’s first processor built on TSMC’s 2nm process node. Apple says it delivers 15 percent faster CPU performance and 30 percent better power efficiency compared to last year’s A19 Pro, with 50 percent higher memory bandwidth feeding the GPU and Neural Engine. The jump to 2nm — a full process generation ahead of the A19 Pro’s 3nm — marks the most significant chip architecture leap in the Pro line in several years.

The camera system gets an across-the-board upgrade to 48MP on all three rear lenses for the first time, including the ultrawide. Apple has also added a variable aperture mechanism to the main lens, allowing hardware-level exposure control rather than purely computational adjustments — a feature that has appeared in competing Android flagships for two years.

On the connectivity side, Apple has replaced Qualcomm’s modem with its own C2 cellular chip, completing the in-house silicon transition that began with the C1 in the iPhone 17e. The move gives Apple tighter integration between the modem and application processor, and eliminates the last major third-party chip dependency in the iPhone lineup.

The displays measure 6.3 inches (Pro) and 6.9 inches (Pro Max), both OLED with 120Hz ProMotion, and the chassis retains the titanium frame introduced two generations ago. Storage starts at 256GB, with Apple adding a 2TB option to the smaller Pro model for the first time. RAM is 12GB across both configurations.

Pricing starts at $1,099 for the iPhone 18 Pro (256GB) — a $100 increase over its predecessor — and $1,199 for the Pro Max. iOS 27 ships preloaded, with new Apple Intelligence features including expanded on-device processing for Siri tasks and an updated Writing Tools suite.

The separately announced iPhone Duo, Apple’s first foldable, was also revealed at the September 9 event but ships later: preorders open October 16, with delivery beginning October 23, at a starting price of $1,999.

As reported by TechCrunch, Apple’s fall event also introduced the Apple Watch Series 12 and AirPods 5, both available now.