Apple finally revealed the iPhone 16e this week, the company's latest mid-range phone, but the question is how does the newest iPhone perform?
Apple isn't obfuscating that the 16e will be a bit weaker than the mainline iPhone 16 models. The A18 chip is the same as the other handsets. However, the 16e version has a weaker GPU with a 4-core setup, versus 5-core in the base iPhone 16.
Today, the iPhone 16e popped up on Geekbench with a single test under the model number "iPhone 17,5" and running 8GB of RAM. It was shared by WhyLab on Weibo.
The test phone produced a single-core score of 2,706 and a multi-core score of 7,942. The leaked scores are a mixed bag, though other places are reporting that it appears far lower than the base iPhone 16.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | Single Core | Multicore | Header Cell - Column 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
Apple iPhone 16e (leak) | 2,706 | 7,942 | Row 0 - Cell 3 |
Apple iPhone 16 | 3,301 | 8,033 | Row 1 - Cell 3 |
Samsung Galaxy S25 | 2,916 | 9,886 | Row 2 - Cell 3 |
In our testing, the vanilla iPhone 16 scored much higher in the single core in the single core testing at 3,301 and a bit higher in multicore with a score of 8,033.
It's also much weaker than the recently released Samsung Galaxy S25 base model. Yes, Samsung typically underperforms Apple in the single core testing but often blows Apple out of the water when it comes to multicore thanks to how the Korean company optimizes its chips.
It indicates a general increase of around 10% more power in the regular iPhone 16 compared to the 16e. That is interesting since both phones are supposed to have the same number of CPU cores and clock speed.
The 16e's alleged performance isn't a problem if you consider it as a mid-range device that Apple deliberately curtails with missing features like the surprising lack of MagSafe charging. However, the cheapest 16e is only $200 less than the least expensive version of iPhone 16.
Perhaps the lack of MagSafe, an ultrawide camera, and a reduction in performance is worth the lower price, but that's something for buyers to consider before picking up a 16e.
As a reminder this is a single test and may not be totally indicative of how the 16e actually performs once we put it through our wide range of tests.
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