A few years back, you were mostly forced to get a Pro Max model if you wanted a large display on your iPhone. However, in 2022, Apple reintroduced the Plus designation, affixing it to a 6.7-inch model to broaden consumer options and fill the void left by the discontinuation of the iPhone mini.
Fast-forward to 2023, and we witnessed the latest Plus version poised to rival the Pro Max for the title of heavyweight champion. At first glance, these smartphones boast striking similarities, making them indistinguishable, particularly from a distance. Yet, upon closer examination, the disparities become glaringly evident, revealing which one aligns better with individual preferences.
Now, it's 2024, so it's time to turn our heads to the upcoming iPhone 16 series. Both the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus will get succeeded by the iPhone 16 Pro Max and the iPhone 16 Plus, respectively.
Stay tuned as we meticulously compare the iPhone 15 Plus and the iPhone 15 Pro Max. Our comprehensive assessment spans various aspects, including display brightness, real-world battery performance evaluations, and performance testing.
Now, in 2024, the differences between the two phones are still mostly unchanged, and they are still positioned in such a way that once you start considering the iPhone 15 Plus, Apple might easily entice you into getting the pricier, but also more capable iPhone 15 Pro Max. How exactly is Cupertino doing that? And should you buy any of these phones or wait for the iPhone 16 series, which is just around the corner? Let's find out!
iPhone 15 Pro Max
iPhone 15 Plus
6.7-inch OLED with 120Hz ProMotion
6.7-inch OLED with 60Hz refresh rate
Faster A17 Pro chip on board
The older A16 chip
Telephoto with 5X optical zoom
No telephoto camera
Customizable Action Button on the iPhone 15 Pro Max
Both of these sport big 6.7-inch OLED panels, but here's where the similarities end. The iPhone 15 Pro Max comes with ProMotion technology, allowing the screen to switch between 1 and 120Hz and everything in between, while the iPhone 15 Plus sports the old-school 60Hz refresh rate.
Another big difference that stems from the above is that the iPhone 15 Pro Max has an Always On mode, while the Plus doesn't. The typical brightness of the Pro Max model is a tad higher at 1,000 nits (versus 800 nits on the Plus), but the peak HDR brightness, and peak outdoor brightness are the same, 1,600 and 2,000 nits respectively. As you can see from our display benchmarks below, both the iPhone 15 Pro Max and iPhone 15 Plus feature great displays, very bright and color accurate.
The deciding factor here will be the refresh rate and Always-on mode. If you need those, you should pick the iPhone 15 Pro Max. Otherwise, the iPhone 15 Plus has equally bright and crisp display, although not as smooth.
The CIE 1931 xy color gamut chart represents the set(area)of colors that a display can reproduce,with the sRGB colorspace(the highlighted triangle)serving as reference.The chart also provides a visual representation of a display's color accuracy. The small squares across the boundaries of the triangle are the reference points for the various colors, while the small dots are the actual measurements. Ideally, each dot should be positioned on top of its respective square. The 'x:CIE31' and 'y:CIE31' values in the table below the chart indicate the position of each measurement on the chart. 'Y' shows the luminance (in nits) of each measured color, while 'Target Y' is the desired luminance level for that color. Finally, 'ΔE 2000' is the Delta E value of the measured color. Delta E values of below 2 are ideal.
The Color accuracy chart gives an idea of how close a display's measured colors are to their referential values. The first line holds the measured (actual) colors, while the second line holds the reference (target) colors. The closer the actual colors are to the target ones, the better.
The Grayscale accuracy chart shows whether a display has a correct white balance(balance between red,green and blue)across different levels of grey(from dark to bright).The closer the Actual colors are to the Target ones,the better.
As far as design goes, another big change is the switch to a titanium frame on the iPhone 15 Pro Max. The Plus model stays with aluminum, and it's safe to say that this results in a significant difference in feel, weight, and durability.
Another new feature that the 15 Pro Max brings onboard is the new Action Button. This new, multifunctional button replaces the Mute Switch, but the feature is reserved exclusively for the Pro models, so the iPhone 15 Plus stays with the more conventional mute switch.
The phones feel similar. If you wonder whether titanium makes a huge difference, we don't feel like it does. It's nice to the touch and looks cool, but the weight difference is not that big, and the overall user experience while holding both the iPhone 15 Plus and the iPhone 15 Pro Max is very similar. Add a case to that equation, and you'll further mitigate any design and feel differences.
Both phones sport USB-C connectivity, as the EU mandated the change in order for Apple to be able to continue selling iPhones in Europe. However, the vanilla and Plus models are limited to USB 2.0 transfer speeds, while the faster USB 3.0 is reserved for the Pro versions.
The color options for the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus are also different; you can check the available color options below.
iPhone 15 Plus colors:
Pink
Yellow
Green
Blue
Black
iPhone 15 Pro Max colors:
Black Titanium
White Titanium
Blue Titanium
Natural Titanium
Performance and Software
Different silicon, but plenty of performance on both phones
The iPhone 15 Pro Max comes equipped with the latest and greatest in mobile silicon technology, the Apple A17 Pro chipset. This chip is built on a 3nm technology node and has the potential to bring massive gains over its predecessor, both in performance and efficiency. Apple claims that this six-core chipset is 20% faster than the A16 and our synthetic benchmarks corroborate this.
That being said, Apple's silicon has been at the top of most synthetic benchmarks for years, and this fact, paired with the great software optimization, means that you won't feel a major difference between the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus, although the latter uses last year's A16.
The RAM situation is similar, with the iPhone 15 Pro Max sporting 8GB of RAM, while the Plus comes with "only" 6GB. In practice, you probably won't feel any difference in day-to-day performance between these two phones. We're practically living with both phones now, and we haven't spotted much of a difference in fluidity and smoothness, regarding the pure speed of both phones.
Currently, both the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus come with iOS 17 out of the box. The next installment, iOS 18, is coming soon with tons of customization and new features that bring major revamps to Photos and other stock apps. The most important new feature, however, is Apple Intelligence, which will only come to the iPhone 15 Pro Max––the iPhone 15 Plus won't get the new Apple Intelligence features.
And these are quite intriguing: we are getting revamped Siri, Writing Tools, Mail Summary, Genmoji, and Call Recording with Summary. You can read more about this in our iOS 18 preview.
Camera
5x zoom wins the race
The segregation between the Pro and non-Pro models when it comes to the camera system has carried over this year. The iPhone 15 Pro Max comes equipped with three cameras on the back, while the iPhone 15 Plus has only two.
Both phones feature a 48-megapixel main camera, but the iPhone 15 Pro Max comes with a different aperture (f/1.6 vs f/1.78 on the Plus) and two optical-quality zoom ranges - 1.2x and 1.5x. When shooting in good lighting conditions both phones produce quite pleasant images, the iPhone 15 Pro Max being able to catch just a tad more details. The Pro Max sample also looks warmer, while the Plus seems to overexpose just a little. All in all, not a huge difference in quality when it comes to the main camera.
The ultra-wide camera is very similar on both phones, featuring a 12MP sensor and 13mm focal length. There's a small difference in aperture, the Pro Max comes with an ultra-wide camera with f/2.2, while the Plus has f/2.4. In reality, the images taken with both phones are almost identical, so no clear winner here. You can always check out our other comparisons to see how the iPhones perform against other brands, but if you're choosing between these to, and you use the main and ultrawide cameras most of the time, we think you'll be fine with either model.
The big difference is called the tetraprism zoom lens, and it's found on the new iPhone 15 Pro Max model. This next-gen optical zoom system allows for 5x zoom levels, making the Pro Max a much better option if you're into portraits or use telephoto a lot in your daily photo adventures. The iPhone 15 Plus relies on 2x crop images from the main 48MP sensor to achieve what Apple calls Optical-quality telephoto. As you can see from the samples, the iPhone 15 Pro Max obliterates the Plus at any zoom range above 2X.
Both the iPhone 15 Pro Max and iPhone 15 Plus feature identical front cameras, and unsurprisingly, the results are also identical, give or take the tiny variables in framing the shots. Selfie shots look good, with decent level of detail, natural colors and balanced exposure.
Video Quality
The video quality is great on both phones, there are no major differences when it comes to colors, image detail, stabilization, exposure, etc. The only big difference again comes from the zoom capabilities, the iPhone 15 Pro Max can zoom up to 9X during recording, while the Plus model caps at 6X. The zoom quality is also better on the Pro Max.
The final verdict after we had done all of our camera/video tests is that you're getting a very similar photo and video quality from the main and ultrawide cameras, and the deciding factor is the tetraprism camera on the iPhone 15 Pro Max. If you like to zoom a lot, you'll love the iPhone 15 Pro Max, if you don't care about zoom shots, you'll get almost identical shots from the iPhone 15 Plus.
Audio Quality and Haptics
Don't fix what's not broken
Both the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus come with a stereo speaker configuration: one bottom-firing main speaker and a secondary speaker located in the earpiece.
The audio quality has been pretty good ever since the iPhone 13 series, and the sheer size of both phones allows for more resonance and bass, so these two have similar audio performance. There's no 3.5mm audio jack on either of these, but we're now used to the omission. Both phones sounded rich and detailed in our tests, a pleasure to listen to, whether you're watching a Netflix series or just checking out the latest Taylor Swift video.
In terms of haptics, the Taptic Engine is on duty, and given the great results Apple has been getting with the system over the years, both the iPhone 15 Plus and the iPhone 15 Pro Max feature industry-leading haptics. The vibration is tight and prominent, you won't miss a call or a notification. We were very pleased by the results we got from both the iPhone 15 Plus and iPhone 15 Pro Max during our haptic tests.
Battery Life and Charging
USB-C on both, but different?
Both the iPhone 15 Pro Max and iPhone 15 Plus have received a slight upgrade in battery capacity. The top model now features a 4,422mAh cell, while the Plus comes equipped with a 4,383mAh battery. Funnily enough, the Plus seems to beat the Pro Max in our YouTube and Gaming tests, while the Pro Max takes the win in the Web Browsing category. This might have something to do with the A17 Pro chipset getting hot and throttling, but we might have to run those tests again just to be sure.
The USB-C port made its first appearance on an iPhone device last year. All iPhone 15 models come equipped with this port. However, there is a difference between the USB standard on Pro and non-Pro models. The iPhone 15 Pro Max features the USB 3.2 Gen (10Gbps), while the Plus gets only USB 2.0 (0.5Gbps).
According to our own battery tests, which are ran with the displays set at 200 nits, the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus consistently trade blows. The iPhone 15 Plus wins the 3D gaming and video streaming tests, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro Max has the upper hand in our web browsing test.
PhoneArena Battery Charge Results
Even though we now have USB-C onboard, the charging speeds remain the same, Apple cites 50% charge in 30 minutes with a 20W charger for both the iPhone 15 Plus and the iPhone 15 Pro Max.
In reality, we achieved another peculiar result in our charging test, the iPhone 15 Plus was able to charge to full 30 minutes faster than the Pro Max. 15 and 30 minutes charging times are nearly identical, so again there might be some thermal management going on when topping the battery up to 100%.
The same MagSafe wireless charging technology is also present on both phones, allowing for wireless charging speeds up to 15W, and also the ability to slap a number of cool accessories on the back of both phones, like wallets, kickstands, and attach them to a car charger equipped with MagSafe.
Even though the iPhone 15 Pro Max and the iPhone 15 Plus look very similar from a distance, these are different animals. The top Apple model is a technology stew that comes with all the new ingredients: the latest A17 silicon, a brand-new tetraprism zoom camera, a titanium frame, and a new Action Button. It also features a ProMotion screen and faster transfer speeds through its new USB-C port.
On the other hand, we have the second iteration of the resurrected Plus model. It's roughly the same size, the main camera is similar (albeit taken from last year's Pro models), and the battery size is also pretty much the same.
Which one should you get, then?
The answer is pretty simple. If you want the best Apple has to offer, price not an issue ($1,199) you should go for the iPhone 15 Pro Max. If you just need a larger-screen iPhone with decent performance and great battery life for $899, the iPhone 15 Plus is the right one for you.
The third option here is to hold your horses and wait a couple of months until the iPhone 16 series launches. This will not only give you the option to get the latest and greatest from Apple, but also bring down the price of the current iPhone 15 models.
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Mariyan, a tech enthusiast with a background in Nuclear Physics and Journalism, brings a unique perspective to PhoneArena. His childhood curiosity for gadgets evolved into a professional passion for technology, leading him to the role of Editor-in-Chief at PCWorld Bulgaria before joining PhoneArena. Mariyan's interests range from mainstream Android and iPhone debates to fringe technologies like graphene batteries and nanotechnology. Off-duty, he enjoys playing his electric guitar, practicing Japanese, and revisiting his love for video games and Haruki Murakami's works.
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