Affordable and Apple as concepts are far apart.

Apple’s positioning as a premium brand means that the “cheapest” Apple product still feels pricier than any of the competition.

Then the iPhone 17e comes along and is surprisingly priced similarly to Samsung’s own “value” phone, the Samsung S25FE.

Value is not the same as budget, understand.

This segment belongs to phones that might not pass for the highest-end model in the range, but instead offers enough features to not feel like you’re missing too much.

Like Samsung’s FE or “fan editions” and the iPhone SEs.

This isn’t low-end

But ‘Erna, isn’t that just a midrange phone?’

No, midrange phones are the dullest phones, generally.

Better than entry-level but unexciting.

While the iPhone 17e is the cheapest iPhone, it doesn’t feel cheap and that’s what makes the difference.

The iPhone 17e is what the 16e should have been—with MagSafe support and starting at 256GB storage.

With mobile operating systems growing in size, the previous 128GB starting storage would be inadequate.

As a successor to the iPhone SE, the 17e still feels premium in the hand without the heft of the larger iPhone models.

While you will need to surgically detach the iPhone 17 Pro Max from my wrist, I find that for a lot of people the 17e would be “good enough.”