“iPhones need less RAM than Android phones.” It’s a statement I’ve heard for years, and it has some basis in fact. iOS is an operating system that doesn’t consume as many resources as Android and manages to run smoothly on devices with ridiculous amounts of RAM on rival systems, like the 4GB of RAM in the iPhone 12.

With the iPhone 17 rumors comes more than just interesting information: According to what we read on MacRumors, 12GB of RAM will be a reality in the 2025 iPhone. This reaffirms a view that some of us have held for years: Yes, more RAM was needed.

iPhone 17 and 12 GB RAMThe iPhone 17 models will have 12GB of RAM, at least in the Pro Max versions. There is currently a 2GB difference between the Pro models and the standard models; the iPhone 15 Pro has 8GB, while the iPhone 15 has 6GB.

In the iPhone 16, where 8 GB of RAM is expected for all members of the family, this difference will disappear and the figure will be equal. Two years of acceleration in a memory that until now seemed secondary.

Apple Intelligence, the principal responsible person. There’s a main culprit behind this increase in RAM. Apple Intelligence is a massive, local system that requires a lot of memory. In fact, the iPhone 15 (not the Pro) and previous models won’t be able to run Apple’s AI for one simple reason: they don’t have RAM.

If Apple wants to ensure that its phones are compatible with Apple Intelligence in the future, iPhones will need to opt for a minimum of 8GB of RAM.

Too much RAM is better than too little. The claim that iPhones don’t need a lot of RAM to run is an understatement. They weigh exactly the same and don’t need a lot of power to run well. The point is that when it comes to hardware, more is better than less.

If Apple had been more generous with the RAM on the iPhone 14 Pro and 15, those models could have Apple Intelligence. They simply don’t have the power or capacity to move that AI around, but they are very limited in terms of RAM.

Same way on Macs. This won’t be an iPhone-only thing. According to Gurman, four Mac models will say goodbye to 8GB and will now have 16GB. This was a necessary move because there was almost no reason for a high-end Mac to start with 8GB of RAM.

AI was supposed to come to show us what we already suspected: Big RAM whether it works or not.

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On Xataka | How much RAM do I need in my computer?