With the iPhone 15 and 15 Pro still four months away, speculations regarding the next Apple phone are flying.

The newest news is that the iPhone 15 will have the diagonal rear camera lens structure of the 13 and 14, but the 16 will return to the vertical arrangement of the 12. Clear?

Pictures may help.

Apple’s designers placed the iPhone 7 Plus’s twin rear camera lenses horizontally, like eyeballs. The iPhone X, released the following year, has vertical cameras.

It’s unclear why, but the iPhone 8 Plus introduced a month earlier kept the horizontal design, so it wasn’t necessary. I’m pessimistic, but Apple may have designed the iPhone X to seem different from the rear and front so buyers could show off their latest model.

It seems irrelevant why 2021 went diagonal.

Vertical arrangement lasted years. (On regular models). The new Pro series, starting with the 11 Pro in 2019, has always had three back cameras in a triangle with two on the left and one on the right.

The iPhone 13 became diagonal in 2021. This allows the two rings to tessellate closer and fit bigger sensors without taking up too much chassis space, although Apple didn’t explain why.

The explanation may have been important in 2021, but a reliable leaker predicts Apple will return to the vertical form in 2024. @URedditor, aka Unknownz21, leaked. As AppleInsider writes, they have a brief but good track record, including one significant coup.

As the leaker notes, this would distinguish the 16 from its predecessor, although Apple seldom reverts to an old design like the iPhone 12. (The iPhone 12’s squared-off chassis resembled the iPhone 4, but it was a classic device that nearly no one carried anymore. Many still have iPhone 12s. The leaker clarifies in a follow-up tweet that the iPhone 16 will still seem current in other ways.

Since this is a 2023 iPhone 16 rumor, nothing is certain. Apple’s intentions may alter before the device’s release, and we haven’t heard from another source.