What appears to be a legitimate benchmark of an iPhone 7 Plus with an A10 Fusion processor has been spotted on Geekbench, and its performance scores are impressive. The A10 Fusion in the iPhone 7 Plus outperforms all existing iOS devices equipped with A9 and A9X processors, including the iPhone 6s, the iPhone SE, and the 9.7 and 12.9-inch iPad Pro models.
The iPhone 7 Plus received a single-core score of 3233 and a multi-core score of 5363. Comparatively, the iPhone 6s Plus averages a single-core score of 2407 and a multi-core score of 4046, while the 12.9-inch iPad Pro, which has the highest-clocked A9X chip, has an average single-core score of 3009 and an average multi-core score of 4881.
The iPhone 7 Plus is approximately 33 percent faster than the iPhone 6s when it comes to both single and multi-core scores, and approximately 7 percent faster than the 12.9-inch iPad Pro on single-core tests and nearly 10 percent faster on multi-core tests.
Apple's A10 chip is running at 2.23 GHz, which is potentially under-clocked because rumors suggested it would be capable of running at 2.4 to 2.45GHz. The A9X in the 12.9-inch iPad Pro runs at 2.2GHz, while the A9 in the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus runs at 1.8GHz.
In marketing materials, Apple says the A10 Fusion chip is the most powerful chip ever in a smartphone, running two times faster than the iPhone 6 with graphics performance that's up to three times faster. In Geekbench tests, the iPhone 7 Plus did indeed double the performance of the iPhone 6 Plus on both multi and single-core tests.
The A10 Fusion built into the iPhone 7 is a four-core processor with two high-power cores for handling system intensive tasks and two high-efficiency cores that kick in for less intensive processes to save battery life. Apple says that the iPhone 7 should offer approximately two hours more battery life than the iPhone 6s on average and the iPhone 7 Plus should offer approximately one hour of additional battery life compared to the iPhone 6s Plus.
Friday December 12, 2025 10:56 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Macworld's Filipe Espósito today revealed a handful of features that Apple is allegedly planning for iOS 26.4, iOS 27, and even iOS 28.
The report said the features are referenced within the code for a leaked internal build of iOS 26 that is not meant to be seen by the public. However, it appears that Espósito and/or his sources managed to gain access to it, providing us with a sneak peek...
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Last week, details about unreleased Apple devices and future iOS features were shared by Macworld. This week, we learned where the information came from, plus we have more findings from the leak.
As it turns out, an Apple prototype device running an early build of iOS 26 was sold, and the person who bought it shared the software. The OS has a version number of 23A5234w, and the first...
Monday December 15, 2025 3:05 pm PST by Juli Clover
Software from an iPhone prototype running an early build of iOS 26 leaked last week, giving us a glimpse at future Apple devices and iOS features. We recapped device codenames in our prior article, and now we have a list of some of the most notable feature flags that were found in the software code.
In some cases, it's obvious what the feature flags are referring to, while some are more...
The first foldable iPhone will feature a series of design and hardware firsts for Apple, according to details shared by the Weibo leaker known as Digital Chat Station.
According to a new post, via machine translation, Apple is developing what the leaker describes as a "wide foldable" device, a term used to refer to a horizontally oriented, book-style foldable with a large internal display....
Friday December 12, 2025 10:10 am PST by Juli Clover
Apple today released iOS 26.2, the second major update to the iOS 26 operating system that came out in September, iOS 26.2 comes a little over a month after iOS 26.1 launched. iOS 26.2 is compatible with the iPhone 11 series and later, as well as the second-generation iPhone SE.
The new software can be downloaded on eligible iPhones over-the-air by going to Settings >...
Monday December 15, 2025 4:23 pm PST by Juli Clover
Apple is testing iOS 26.3, the next version of iOS 26 that will launch around January. Since iOS 26.3's testing is happening over the holidays, it is a smaller update with fewer features than we've seen in prior betas.
We've rounded up what's new so far, and we'll add to our list with subsequent betas if we come across any other features.
Transfer to Android
Apple is making it simpler...
Thursday December 11, 2025 8:49 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple seeded the second iOS 26.2 Release Candidate to developers earlier this week, meaning the update will be released to the general public very soon.
Apple confirmed iOS 26.2 would be released in December, but it did not provide a specific date. We expect the update to be released by early next week.
iOS 26.2 includes a handful of new features and changes on the iPhone, such as a new...
Monday December 15, 2025 7:41 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple released the AirPods Max on December 15, 2020, meaning the over-ear headphones launched five years ago today. While the AirPods Max were updated with a USB-C port and new color options last year, followed by support for lossless audio and ultra-low latency audio this year, the headphones lack some of the features that have been introduced for newer generations of the regular AirPods and the ...
At this point, these numbers (for any phone benchmark) are meaningless. The real world observational differences in typical day to day use would be unnoticeable.
There was a time you'd see a difference, but over the last 5 years phones are so fast, no one will see any kind of difference.
The A9 is still faster than the Snapdragon 820, and now this.
But because Apple doesn't change the phone's shape, it is clear that Apple is not INNOVATIVE! Apple should be like Samsung, putting random features like iris scanner (that is more cumbersome to use). That's innovation!
My 6s Plus and iPad 9.7" Pro are both so fast already that I find myself not totally frothing at the mouth for this. Sure I'll always take more speed, but for the first time ever, I'm not impatiently awaiting the speed upgrade. In fact, I'm asking myself if I'll even notice the additional performance. There is absolutely NOTHING slow about my current-gen devices.
And I've owned every iPhone since the 3G, and most prior generation iPads, and this was never true before. In comparison the iPhone 6 was kind of a dog, and the page and app reloads annoying. But not anymore with the A9/A9x.
The fact that Apple took it such a huge step further with the 10 is nuts in the best way possible. I love it. I also dig that they both boosted performance and efficiency with the lower powered cores. Nice move.
