**Apple's 2016 Products: A Recap**

This year has been an exciting one for Apple, with several new products and updates to existing ones that have left a lasting impression on tech enthusiasts. In this article, we'll take a closer look at some of the most notable Apple products from 2016, including their features, design, and overall value.

**AirPods: A Game-Changing Wireless Headphone Experience**

One of the most anticipated products from Apple in 2016 was the AirPods, wireless earbuds that promised to revolutionize the way we listen to music and take calls on our devices. With built-in batteries and Bluetooth radios, these tiny earpieces feature infrared sensors that detect when they're inserted into your ears and automatically pause or resume playback accordingly. They also boast built-in microphones and accelerometers, allowing users to tap them to invoke Siri, answer phone calls, or just pause and play media. The charging case provides up to 24 hours of charge, while the AirPods themselves last around 5 hours on a single charge – an impressive feat for such small devices.

The seamless pairing experience is another standout feature of the AirPods. Once paired with one device, they automatically pair with all other iOS and Mac OS devices, eliminating the need to repeat the pairing process. This level of convenience has made wireless headphones a breeze to use, and Apple's implementation of this technology has set a new standard for the industry.

**MacBook Pros: Thinner, Lighter, and More Powerful**

Another highly anticipated product from Apple in 2016 was the MacBook Pro, a laptop that promised to be thinner, lighter, and more powerful than its predecessors. The new 13- and 15-inch models boast dramatically reduced sizes and weights, thanks to advancements in display technology and keyboard design.

The revised butterfly mechanism used in the keyboards is particularly noteworthy, providing a responsive and tactile typing experience without adding bulk. The P3 displays on these laptops are also brighter with a wider color gamut, delivering sharper blacks and more vibrant colors. Furthermore, the touch trackpad has been enlarged to provide more room for gestures, while palm rejection technology ensures that accidental taps or swipes are minimized.

The real showstoppers, however, are the Touch Bar and Touch ID features, which have generated significant buzz among tech enthusiasts. While some may find the Touch Bar's functionality limited by its reliance on app support, it remains a valuable addition for users who can take advantage of its features. The inclusion of Touch ID has also been widely praised, offering a convenient and secure way to unlock devices.

One potential drawback of the new MacBook Pros is the removal of traditional ports in favor of Thunderbolt 3, which requires adapters for older peripherals. While this move may be seen as a step backward by some, it also makes these laptops more future-proof, capable of supporting higher-speed SSDs and 5K displays. However, the lack of MagSafe and SD card slots has been a point of contention among users.

**iPhone 7 Plus: A Flagship Device with Room for Improvement**

The iPhone 7 Plus is Apple's latest flagship device, boasting significant design tweaks and improvements that have made it one of the most stunning smartphone designs on the market. The new jet-black color finish seamlessly integrates with the glass front and polished aluminum body, making the antenna stripes all but invisible.

While some may be disappointed by the familiar design, the iPhone 7 Plus is a notable upgrade in terms of camera capabilities. A wider aperture lens and dual-camera setup have improved low-light performance, while the P3 display delivers brighter and more vibrant colors than ever before. Furthermore, the addition of waterproofing has made this device even more durable and practical for everyday use.

Two features that have particularly stood out to me are the stereo speakers and waterproofing. The iPhone 7 Plus is now one of the best-selling smartphones on the market thanks in large part to its exceptional audio capabilities, while the added durability provided by waterproofing is a welcome feature for users who need a device that can withstand rough handling.

Overall, the iPhone 7 Plus has cemented its place as Apple's most polished and important product, offering a user experience that is both seamless and highly engaging.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwhat's up guys Mike here the Detroit Board with my annual look back and app throughout the year with my top 5 picks for that year I've been doing this since 2010 and it's always kind of fun to look back to see how things have evolved since that time now relatively speaking 2016 was a fairly quiet year for Apple after a very busy 2015 so in the spring we got a spec bump for the 12-inch MacBook along with a rolls gold color option now this would be the only Mac update besides the all new MacBook Pros that arrived later in the fall so nothing else was touched including the IMAX the Mac Pro and the long-suffering Mac Mini the iPad also had a very quiet year but we did get an all-new 9.7 inch iPad pro in the spring we also got no less than three new iPhones this year with the iPhone se coming in the spring and the all new iPhone 7 and 7 plus arriving in the fall the Apple watch lineup was also overhauled as well and was divided into series 1 and series 2 both of them picking up faster CPUs while the series 2 picked up a larger battery brighter displays better waterproofing and GPS antennas the Apple watch Edition series 2 also dropped gold for ceramic and became a lot cheaper and the Apple watch sport was effectively replaced by a Nike edition we also got a series of new nylon watch bands and a space black Milanese loop all of which I reviewed now the real news however for the Apple watch was a complete software overhaul with watch OS 3 which dramatically improved performance and usability for all Apple watches iowa's 10 brought hundreds of new features including an overhauled messaging app that allowed you to send animated wallpapers and message bubbles with a constantly expanding and evolving emoji library iOS 10 also integrated home kit automation controls eliminated swipe to unlock expanded the usefulness of widgets added more features to 3d touch introduced raised to wake a very useful feature and overhauled virtually every app with tons of new features including collaboration in the Notes app a much smarter Photos app with contextual awareness and a vastly improved music app Mac OS Sierra is mostly significant for its name change which brings it in line with the other OS platforms however the changes themselves are actually very small adding Siri and Apple pay for the first time and a bunch of revised apps that integrate many of the features that also came with iowa's 10 TV OS was also updated with a revised music app improved Siri features and a dark mode later in the year we saw the launch of single sign-on for cable subscribers and a new TV app which is a one-stop location to aggregate and manage video content from all of your video apps Apple's only major new accessories this year were the air pods which arrived far behind schedule but I think we're worth the wait we also saw revised cases and new colors for several accessories to go along with the new iPhones and iPads and perhaps the most unexpected Apple products of the year is designed by Apple in California if for the graphic history of Apple over the past 20 years although welcomed by many fans and addy that's a very nicely made book it was widely ridiculed as uncharacteristically retrospective for the company now beyond the natural succession of new iPhones iPads and Macs Apple also discontinued several aging products including the Thunderbolt Display 11 inch MacBook Air the MacBook Pro with an optical drive which was very old and the third generation Apple TV in addition to the long-forgotten Apple battery charger so getting into my list for number 5 I'm going with the iPhone se this is Apple's surprise commitment to the small 4-inch screen form factor which has proven to be very popular but essentially this is a spec upgrade of the iPhone 5s which brought it up to speed with the iPhone 6s thanks to the a9 CPU this is also the first time that the cheapest iPhone was just as powerful as the most expensive iPhone this also makes it the most powerful phone of its size and very unique in the market we also get a new 12 megapixel camera with 4k video recording which brings it up to speed again with the most expensive iPhone 6s until the iPhone 7 plus came out although the design is unchanged we did get a rolls gold colour option but we did lose the polished champers the se still remains one of my favorite phone designs although it's far too small for me now that I'm used to larger phones however with most of the same capabilities as the larger and more expensive iPhones this is a tiny powerhouse with excellent mhairi life that proves that not everybody wants a large phone when a small phone can be just as capable moving on to number four the only new iPad this year was the nine point seven inch iPad pro which is Apple's most powerful and feature-packed iPad yet it really is more than just a shrunken down version of the twelve point nine iPad pro picking up improved specs and features in virtually all areas it was the first iOS device this year to get a p3 display and currently the only iPad to feature this brighter and more colorful panel it also picked up the same 5 megapixel FaceTime AC camera and 12 megapixel 4k iSight camera from the iPhones along with the first LED flash on an iPad it's also the first iPad and currently the only iPad to get the rolls gold color option with a revised antenna design that reduced the RF transparent plastic on the back to just a thin strip similar to an iPhone but just like the bigger iPad pro we have support for the Apple pencil along with those incredible quad stereo speakers which automatically reorient eight the sound depending on how you're holding the iPad we also got a keyboard accessory to match the size of the smaller iPad pro which works surprisingly well for its small size and once again that connects to the smart connector along the side of the iPad pro although I seldom use an iPad this is the one I always grab and it remains the clear spec leader among all the iPads this year for number three I've chosen Apple's air pods which solve a significant problem with wireless headphones by making them extremely simple to pair and to charge although if you're not a fan of Wired ear pods you likely won't find the air pods much better although they do sound a bit better than the wired headphones now the air pods are essentially Wireless the ear pods with built-in batteries and Bluetooth radios there are infrared sensors on the earpieces which detect when the air pods are in your ears and automatically pause or resume playback when you take them in or out they also have built-in microphones and accelerometers so you can tap them to invoke searing answer a phone call or just pause and play media the charging case provides 24 hours of charge while the air pods themselves max out at around 5 hours of listening between each charge which is outstanding for any bluetooth headphones especially ones this small now usually my favorite aspect of these headphones is that because they sink to your iCloud account once paired to one device they are paired to all of them so you can easily jump between any iOS or Mac OS device without repeating the pairing or unparent process which is typical for most bluetooth headphones also going to the air pods finally make wireless headphones convenient to use and have become one of my most used Apple devices this year for number two I've gone with the most anticipated new laptops in years the all-new MacBook Pros which are available in three distinct configurations a 13-inch without a touch bar and the 13 or 15 inch with a touch bar now all of them are dramatically thinner smaller and lighter than their aging predecessors and they achieve this by shrinking the battery's keyboard display and overall footprint the new keyboards are very shallow but I actually really liked them thanks to a revised butterfly mechanism that feels more responsive and tactile while remaining light and very fast to type on the new p3 displays are much brighter with a wider color gamut and the differences are noticeable thanks to sharper blacks and more vibrant colors the first touch trackpad is also doubled in size but palm rejection has been excellent in my experience so far the real marquee news for these laptops is touch bar and touch ID which I cover extensively in my review videos the most welcomed feature for me here is touch ID along with Apple Wash Auto unlock which arrived with Mac OS but the touch bar is more complicated the touch bar is one of those features that is nice to have but it's not the reason to buy the macbook pro unless you find an app that can take advantage of it but to make effective use of it you really have to routinely look down at the keyword to see the tools that pop up and that's a habit I just haven't developed yet the new MacBook Pros also generated some controversy by replacing all ports with Thunderbolt 3 necessitating the need for adapters this also meant the elimination of MagSafe and SD card slots all popular features from the previous generation but the great thing here is that you can use any port to recharge the MacBook Thunderbolt 3 also makes up for this because of its high bandwidth so it can support 5k displays and very fast SSD external drives making them far more future-proof even if the future hasn't quite arrived yet the new MacBook Pros did lose the light an Apple logo but I think the designs look fantastic especially in space grain but I have experienced some inconsistency in terms of merri life especially on the touch bar models because of the higher-end processors while the baseline model seems to be pretty reliable but I think the biggest issue is that the prices have increased significantly over the previous models which makes them very complicated recommendations until they go through another revision and price cut and lastly my favorite new Apple product this year is the iPhone 7 plus although disappointing to some because of its familiar design and the elimination of the head Jack the improvements are significant and the iPhone remains the most important product I use on a daily basis I think the design tweaks significantly improve the look of the phone but it's the new jet black color that really makes the iPhone 7 one of the most stunning smartphone designs we've seen this year I really like how the polished black aluminum finished seamlessly blends with a glass on the front and makes the antenna stripes virtually disappear the new camera brings some welcome improvements with a wider aperture for better low-light performance and a dual camera setup for optical zoom we also get a brighter p3 display for the first time on an iPhone which although a little warmer than the previous iPhone delivers brighter and more vibrant colors my favorite improvements actually come down to two features waterproofing and stereo speakers the stereo speakers makes the iPhone one of the best-selling smartphones on the market and waterproofing makes the phone that much more durable and as always the new 810 chip makes the iPhone the most powerful smartphone by miles while maintaining some of the best Barre life so once again the iPhone tops my list because it remains Apple's most polished and important product alrighty guys hope you enjoyed this recap of Apple in 2016 of course I have individual videos on all these products and all the accessories so if you guys want to check those out I'll leave them linked in the description below and if you like this video please give it a thumbs up to let me know and Happy New Yearwhat's up guys Mike here the Detroit Board with my annual look back and app throughout the year with my top 5 picks for that year I've been doing this since 2010 and it's always kind of fun to look back to see how things have evolved since that time now relatively speaking 2016 was a fairly quiet year for Apple after a very busy 2015 so in the spring we got a spec bump for the 12-inch MacBook along with a rolls gold color option now this would be the only Mac update besides the all new MacBook Pros that arrived later in the fall so nothing else was touched including the IMAX the Mac Pro and the long-suffering Mac Mini the iPad also had a very quiet year but we did get an all-new 9.7 inch iPad pro in the spring we also got no less than three new iPhones this year with the iPhone se coming in the spring and the all new iPhone 7 and 7 plus arriving in the fall the Apple watch lineup was also overhauled as well and was divided into series 1 and series 2 both of them picking up faster CPUs while the series 2 picked up a larger battery brighter displays better waterproofing and GPS antennas the Apple watch Edition series 2 also dropped gold for ceramic and became a lot cheaper and the Apple watch sport was effectively replaced by a Nike edition we also got a series of new nylon watch bands and a space black Milanese loop all of which I reviewed now the real news however for the Apple watch was a complete software overhaul with watch OS 3 which dramatically improved performance and usability for all Apple watches iowa's 10 brought hundreds of new features including an overhauled messaging app that allowed you to send animated wallpapers and message bubbles with a constantly expanding and evolving emoji library iOS 10 also integrated home kit automation controls eliminated swipe to unlock expanded the usefulness of widgets added more features to 3d touch introduced raised to wake a very useful feature and overhauled virtually every app with tons of new features including collaboration in the Notes app a much smarter Photos app with contextual awareness and a vastly improved music app Mac OS Sierra is mostly significant for its name change which brings it in line with the other OS platforms however the changes themselves are actually very small adding Siri and Apple pay for the first time and a bunch of revised apps that integrate many of the features that also came with iowa's 10 TV OS was also updated with a revised music app improved Siri features and a dark mode later in the year we saw the launch of single sign-on for cable subscribers and a new TV app which is a one-stop location to aggregate and manage video content from all of your video apps Apple's only major new accessories this year were the air pods which arrived far behind schedule but I think we're worth the wait we also saw revised cases and new colors for several accessories to go along with the new iPhones and iPads and perhaps the most unexpected Apple products of the year is designed by Apple in California if for the graphic history of Apple over the past 20 years although welcomed by many fans and addy that's a very nicely made book it was widely ridiculed as uncharacteristically retrospective for the company now beyond the natural succession of new iPhones iPads and Macs Apple also discontinued several aging products including the Thunderbolt Display 11 inch MacBook Air the MacBook Pro with an optical drive which was very old and the third generation Apple TV in addition to the long-forgotten Apple battery charger so getting into my list for number 5 I'm going with the iPhone se this is Apple's surprise commitment to the small 4-inch screen form factor which has proven to be very popular but essentially this is a spec upgrade of the iPhone 5s which brought it up to speed with the iPhone 6s thanks to the a9 CPU this is also the first time that the cheapest iPhone was just as powerful as the most expensive iPhone this also makes it the most powerful phone of its size and very unique in the market we also get a new 12 megapixel camera with 4k video recording which brings it up to speed again with the most expensive iPhone 6s until the iPhone 7 plus came out although the design is unchanged we did get a rolls gold colour option but we did lose the polished champers the se still remains one of my favorite phone designs although it's far too small for me now that I'm used to larger phones however with most of the same capabilities as the larger and more expensive iPhones this is a tiny powerhouse with excellent mhairi life that proves that not everybody wants a large phone when a small phone can be just as capable moving on to number four the only new iPad this year was the nine point seven inch iPad pro which is Apple's most powerful and feature-packed iPad yet it really is more than just a shrunken down version of the twelve point nine iPad pro picking up improved specs and features in virtually all areas it was the first iOS device this year to get a p3 display and currently the only iPad to feature this brighter and more colorful panel it also picked up the same 5 megapixel FaceTime AC camera and 12 megapixel 4k iSight camera from the iPhones along with the first LED flash on an iPad it's also the first iPad and currently the only iPad to get the rolls gold color option with a revised antenna design that reduced the RF transparent plastic on the back to just a thin strip similar to an iPhone but just like the bigger iPad pro we have support for the Apple pencil along with those incredible quad stereo speakers which automatically reorient eight the sound depending on how you're holding the iPad we also got a keyboard accessory to match the size of the smaller iPad pro which works surprisingly well for its small size and once again that connects to the smart connector along the side of the iPad pro although I seldom use an iPad this is the one I always grab and it remains the clear spec leader among all the iPads this year for number three I've chosen Apple's air pods which solve a significant problem with wireless headphones by making them extremely simple to pair and to charge although if you're not a fan of Wired ear pods you likely won't find the air pods much better although they do sound a bit better than the wired headphones now the air pods are essentially Wireless the ear pods with built-in batteries and Bluetooth radios there are infrared sensors on the earpieces which detect when the air pods are in your ears and automatically pause or resume playback when you take them in or out they also have built-in microphones and accelerometers so you can tap them to invoke searing answer a phone call or just pause and play media the charging case provides 24 hours of charge while the air pods themselves max out at around 5 hours of listening between each charge which is outstanding for any bluetooth headphones especially ones this small now usually my favorite aspect of these headphones is that because they sink to your iCloud account once paired to one device they are paired to all of them so you can easily jump between any iOS or Mac OS device without repeating the pairing or unparent process which is typical for most bluetooth headphones also going to the air pods finally make wireless headphones convenient to use and have become one of my most used Apple devices this year for number two I've gone with the most anticipated new laptops in years the all-new MacBook Pros which are available in three distinct configurations a 13-inch without a touch bar and the 13 or 15 inch with a touch bar now all of them are dramatically thinner smaller and lighter than their aging predecessors and they achieve this by shrinking the battery's keyboard display and overall footprint the new keyboards are very shallow but I actually really liked them thanks to a revised butterfly mechanism that feels more responsive and tactile while remaining light and very fast to type on the new p3 displays are much brighter with a wider color gamut and the differences are noticeable thanks to sharper blacks and more vibrant colors the first touch trackpad is also doubled in size but palm rejection has been excellent in my experience so far the real marquee news for these laptops is touch bar and touch ID which I cover extensively in my review videos the most welcomed feature for me here is touch ID along with Apple Wash Auto unlock which arrived with Mac OS but the touch bar is more complicated the touch bar is one of those features that is nice to have but it's not the reason to buy the macbook pro unless you find an app that can take advantage of it but to make effective use of it you really have to routinely look down at the keyword to see the tools that pop up and that's a habit I just haven't developed yet the new MacBook Pros also generated some controversy by replacing all ports with Thunderbolt 3 necessitating the need for adapters this also meant the elimination of MagSafe and SD card slots all popular features from the previous generation but the great thing here is that you can use any port to recharge the MacBook Thunderbolt 3 also makes up for this because of its high bandwidth so it can support 5k displays and very fast SSD external drives making them far more future-proof even if the future hasn't quite arrived yet the new MacBook Pros did lose the light an Apple logo but I think the designs look fantastic especially in space grain but I have experienced some inconsistency in terms of merri life especially on the touch bar models because of the higher-end processors while the baseline model seems to be pretty reliable but I think the biggest issue is that the prices have increased significantly over the previous models which makes them very complicated recommendations until they go through another revision and price cut and lastly my favorite new Apple product this year is the iPhone 7 plus although disappointing to some because of its familiar design and the elimination of the head Jack the improvements are significant and the iPhone remains the most important product I use on a daily basis I think the design tweaks significantly improve the look of the phone but it's the new jet black color that really makes the iPhone 7 one of the most stunning smartphone designs we've seen this year I really like how the polished black aluminum finished seamlessly blends with a glass on the front and makes the antenna stripes virtually disappear the new camera brings some welcome improvements with a wider aperture for better low-light performance and a dual camera setup for optical zoom we also get a brighter p3 display for the first time on an iPhone which although a little warmer than the previous iPhone delivers brighter and more vibrant colors my favorite improvements actually come down to two features waterproofing and stereo speakers the stereo speakers makes the iPhone one of the best-selling smartphones on the market and waterproofing makes the phone that much more durable and as always the new 810 chip makes the iPhone the most powerful smartphone by miles while maintaining some of the best Barre life so once again the iPhone tops my list because it remains Apple's most polished and important product alrighty guys hope you enjoyed this recap of Apple in 2016 of course I have individual videos on all these products and all the accessories so if you guys want to check those out I'll leave them linked in the description below and if you like this video please give it a thumbs up to let me know and Happy New Year\n"