iPhone 18 Pro: Apple's C2 Modem to Support 5G Satellite Connectivity

Apple's next-generation C2 modem volition bring enactment for 5G outer connectivity to this year's iPhone 18 Pro models, based connected claims made by a Chinese leaker.


In a station connected Weibo, the relationship "Fixed Focus Digital" said that Apple's C2 baseband modem – expected to debut successful iPhone 18 Pro models – volition enactment NR-NTN, oregon New Radio Non-Terrestrial Networks.

The NR-NTN modular tin subordinate to nonstop phone-to-satellite links arsenic good arsenic the usage of satellites arsenic backhaul for bearer networks to widen sum into distant areas. Going connected a instrumentality translation, the leaker appears to suggest Apple's implementation volition let iPhones to link straight to satellites for net access.

This is not the archetypal clip we person heard rumors that the iPhone 18 Pro volition enactment 5G outer connectivity. However, it is the archetypal juncture that NR-NTN enactment has been explicitly tied to Apple's C2 modem arsenic a method specification of its baseband stack.

Last October, The Information's Wayne Ma reported that Apple plans to adhd enactment successful iPhones arsenic aboriginal arsenic this twelvemonth for 5G networks that "aren't tethered to Earth's surface, which includes satellites." This would reportedly springiness the iPhone afloat net entree implicit satellite.

Then successful November, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman referenced Ma's study and said that Apple is processing "satellite implicit 5G" for this year's iPhones, allowing the devices to leverage cellular towers to pat satellites for accrued sum erstwhile modular networks aren't available.

Note that Gurman's study describes enactment for a outer backhaul for bearer networks, not the nonstop device-to-satellite exemplary that Fixed Focus Digital latest leak and Ma's study suggests.

According to Gurman, Apple is besides moving connected respective further outer features, including an API to fto developers adhd outer connections to third-party apps, satellite-powered Apple Maps, and enactment for photos successful outer messages. Apple besides reportedly aims to destruct the request to physically constituent the instrumentality toward the sky, allowing outer to enactment connected successful your pouch oregon adjacent indoors.

It's unclear what signifier of improvement these different features are in, and there's a precocious likelihood that they bash not subordinate to Apple's archetypal adoption of 5G outer connectivity this year. Bringing galore of these features to marketplace volition besides necessitate large upgrades to Globalstar's aging outer infrastructure, which Apple presently relies on.

Apple's existing outer features connected iPhone 14 models and newer are constricted to the Emergency SOS feature, the Find My and Messages apps, and roadside assistance. These features necessitate you to person a wide presumption of the entity for nonstop outer communication.

Previous reporting suggests that the C2 modem volition beryllium much susceptible than the existent C1 and C1X. The C2 whitethorn diagnostic mmWave 5G connectivity, for example, and it is apt to beryllium person successful show to the Qualcomm modem chips that it volition replace.

Fixed Focus Digital antecedently broke the quality up of motorboat astir the iPhone 16e name for Apple's upcoming iPhone SE successor.
This article, "iPhone 18 Pro: Apple's C2 Modem to Support 5G Satellite Connectivity" archetypal appeared connected MacRumors.com

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