This week, a quick update on my own project, Appleā€™s ambitious Mac roadmap, a major new financing push, and an unwelcome legal setback for Cupertino.
A Quick Update From Me...
When I launched iPhone Essentials Plus back in January 2025, the idea was simple: build a searchable home for all the tips and guides I create on YouTube, so people could find what they needed without trawling through hundreds of videos. Over 2,000 of you bought it, which I'm genuinely grateful for. But over the past 18 months, something became clear. The people buying the course fell into two very different groups.
The first group were experienced iPhone users who wanted power tips, hidden features, and deeper guidance. They knew their way around an iPhone and just wanted a comprehensive reference library they could dip in and out of. The second group were people who were newer to the iPhone, less confident, and needed the fundamentals explained from the beginning. Some had switched from Android. Some had been handed an iPhone and never really learned how to use it properly. Both groups were valid. But a single product couldn't serve both of them well.
So I've rebuilt the whole thing from scratch. Instead of one product trying to be two things, there will soon be two distinct products, each designed properly for the people it's meant to serve.
iPhone Essentials Plus has been completely rewritten. It's built for the first group: experienced users who want a comprehensive, searchable catalogue of tips (preview of the more thourough look in the screenshots above). Over 250 brand-new lessons, each one longer and more detailed than before, with written guides and downloadable PDFs. The search system has been rebuilt from the ground up. It should feel like a proper, cohesive library rather than a collection of material that's accumulated over time. It's coming in the next few days.
iPhone Essentials is the brand new product for beginners. It's not simply a searchable library. It's a structured course with a beginning, middle, and end. It tells you where to start and walks you through everything in order: how your iPhone works, how iCloud fits in, and how all the pieces connect. It's designed to build confidence, not just demonstrate features. This one is a few weeks away from launching.
If you already own iPhone Essentials Plus, everything is taken care of.
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You keep all the existing content in a dedicated legacy section.
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You get the complete rebuilt Plus library at no extra cost. It's rolling out over the next week.
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And you'll get iPhone Essentials for free when it launches.
That was always the promise: lifetime updates, and I'm honouring it.
Here's the bit that matters if you've been thinking about buying. Right now, purchasing the current version of iPhone Essentials Plus gets you everything: the current course, the rebuilt Plus library as it rolls out over the coming days, and iPhone Essentials when it launches next month. All three, one price.
Once iPhone Essentials launches, the old product stops being sold, and the two new products will be sold separately, each at its own price, and each will cost at least as much as iPhone Essentials Plus costs today. There'll be a bundle option, but it'll be more expensive than what you'd pay right now.
I'm not trying to create false urgency here. This is just how the timing works.
If you've been on the fence, this is genuinely the best value the course has ever offered, and it won't stay this way for long.
Purchase Links;
Apple's Price Hike Now Comes with a Payment Plan
Apple announced earlier this week that it's partnering with Klarna to launch a device leasing programme called Apple Upgrade, reportedly going live next Tuesday. The timing is not a coincidence. After raising prices across almost every Mac and iPad last month, Apple is essentially offering the antidote to the sticker shock it just created.
Here's how it works. Most iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Apple Watches will be available on finance terms: 24 months for iPhones and Apple Watches, 36 months for iPads and Macs. You can pay the device off early if you want to, and Klarna handles the credit side. Apple's existing iPhone Upgrade Programme is expected to be wound down as this replaces it. Notably, budget devices are excluded: the MacBook Neo, iPhone 16, Apple Watch SE, and base iPad won't be eligible. It's US only at launch, with no word yet on when or whether it'll come to other markets.
The cynical reading is obvious. Apple raises prices by hundreds of dollars, then immediately offers you a way to spread those higher prices over two or three years so you don't feel them as much. The monthly payment on a $1,299 MacBook Air sounds a lot more palatable than the number on the price tag. That's not an accident. But the pragmatic reading is that this is simply how most people buy expensive electronics now, and Apple is finally catching up to what car manufacturers, phone networks, and even Peloton worked out years ago: monthly payments remove friction.
Whether it comes to the UK and other markets before the iPhone 18 Pro launch in September is the question that matters most to readers outside the US. If Apple can offer a $1,299 iPhone Pro at $54 a month globally, the pricing conversation changes entirely. If it stays US-only, the rest of us are stuck with the full sticker price.
Apple is Rebuilding the Entire Mac Lineup
Mark Gurman published what might be the most comprehensive Mac roadmap we've ever seen this week, and if you're a Mac user, it makes for exciting reading. Apple is planning to refresh every single Mac it sells over the next two years, with 11 new models in the pipeline. Here's the breakdown.
This autumn, we're getting a refreshed entry-level 14-inch MacBook Pro with the new M6 chip, codenamed J804, alongside the first new iMacs in two years, codenamed J833 and J834. Development on both is reportedly complete and Apple is simply holding them for a fall launch window. These should be the safe, predictable upgrades: faster chips, same designs.
The headline act arrives late 2026 or early 2027: an all-new high-end MacBook Pro in 14-inch and 16-inch sizes, codenamed K114 and K116, featuring OLED touchscreens, a completely redesigned chassis, and M5 Pro or M5 Max chips. Apple is reportedly already testing these internally on macOS 27.1, which is scheduled for late October. This would be the first major MacBook Pro redesign since 2021, and the first Mac with a touchscreen ever.
Early 2027 brings refreshed 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Airs with new chips but similar designs. Later in 2027, a redesigned entry-level MacBook Pro with M7 arrives, adopting the same design language as the high-end OLED models. The MacBook Neo gets a refresh at some point with an A19 Pro chip, more RAM, and new colours. And the follow-up high-end MacBook with M7 Pro and M7 Max chips is pencilled in for late 2027 to early 2028. An OLED MacBook Air? 2028 at the earliest.
The Mac mini and Mac Studio are the wildcards. Both are in testing with new chips, but their launch timing depends entirely on whether Apple can source enough memory to actually build them. Given the current supply situation, nobody is holding their breath.
It's an ambitious roadmap, and it reinforces the sense that the Mac is becoming increasingly central to Apple's business. Sales are projected to climb for a third consecutive year, driven in part by demand from users running AI and agentic workloads. Whether Apple can deliver all 11 models on schedule given the component shortages is another matter, but the intent is clear: if you use a Mac, Apple wants you to have a reason to upgrade within the next 24 months.
Apple Loses the Blood Oxygen Battle
One more story worth flagging from this week: a US judge upheld Masimo's $634 million patent infringement verdict against Apple over the Apple Watch's blood oxygen monitoring feature. This is the same dispute that forced Apple to temporarily remove the blood oxygen sensor from Apple Watch models sold in the US back in 2024, and it's been grinding through the courts ever since.
Masimo, a medical device company that makes hospital-grade pulse oximeters, has argued from the start that Apple copied its light-based blood oxygen sensing technology. Apple has pushed back at every stage, but the courts have consistently sided with Masimo. This latest ruling means Apple now owes Masimo $634 million in damages, although Apple will almost certainly appeal.
What makes this case interesting beyond the legal back-and-forth is what it says about Apple's health ambitions. The Apple Watch has increasingly been positioned as a health device, with blood oxygen monitoring, ECG readings, and sleep tracking all central to the pitch. Losing a patent fight over one of those core health features, and potentially having to license the technology or redesign it, is a meaningful setback. It also raises questions about whether other health-related features on the Watch could face similar challenges from established medical device companies who got there first.
For now, the blood oxygen feature remains available on current Apple Watch models. But $634 million is $634 million, and this saga is far from over.
Tip of the Week
Did you know, you can quickly close all of your open Safari tabs using the following trick? Tap the ellipsis in the bottom right corner of Safari, then choose All Tabs. Long-press on the blue tick button, and chose Close All (it will say how many tabs you currently have open).
