The graphic in the invitation to Apple’s upcoming “Awe dropping” product launch event looks like a thermal image, and that set off furious speculation Tuesday about whether it’s a hint about a feature coming to one of the many products expected to debut that day.
Could it refer to a way to cool the iPhone 17 Pro? Or a new Apple Watch sensor? Something else?
Apple sometimes uses its event invitations to hint about what it will announce, so it’s possible the company is clueing us in.
Apple event invites sometimes drop hints
Anyone with doubts that Apple drops hints about upcoming products in its event invitations simply must look at the graphic for the Let Loose event in spring 2024. It’s an Apple logo in the shape of someone painting with an Apple Pencil. As the Apple Pencil Pro launched at the event, putting the product in the graphic is as unsubtle as a clue can get.
And that’s not the only example. Apple hinted at a new MacBook in November 2020 and new Macs in October 2023, and then delivered. The list could go on.
So it’s really no surprise that people love to examine Apple’s event invites for hints about what the company will unveil.
A thermal image means … what?
Virtually everyone noticed how much the Apple logo in the graphic for the “Awe dropping” event looks like a thermal image. And that set off plenty of speculation after Apple sent out the invites on Tuesday.
Many people jumped on the guess that it’s a reference to the vapor chamber cooling system rumored to be coming to the iPhone 17 Pro models. The performance of processors is limited by heat — they must slow down if their temperature builds up. A cooling system could noticeably speed up Apple’s new handsets.
The #AppleEvent preview is reminiscent of a Thermal Imaging Camera.
A Nod to the Vapor Chamber in the iPhone 17 Pro/17 Pro Max?
Examine how it moves Up and Down and how 'cool' the Apple Logo is. It's as if Heat will be a Non-Issue iPhone moving forward.
Tapping it and the… pic.twitter.com/VzLwzFZVCy
— Fadhel (@LAFadhel) August 26, 2025
But that’s not the only guess based on the hope that the thermal image in the Apple event graphic is a real hint.
“AirPods Pro were rumored to get camera sensors for heart rate tracking at one point, and competitors like my Pixel 9 Pro have a thermometer feature,” developer Steve Troughton-Smith posted Wednesday on Mastodon. “Sure would be neat if the new iPhones could do FLIR built-in.”
FLIR stands for forward-looking infrared, a technology that creates images from heat signatures.
Maybe it’s an Apple Watch feature
Leander Kahney, Cult of Mac’s publisher and editor in chief, went another way. He used our daily newsletter on Tuesday to speculate that the Apple event image “could hint at a new blood pressure monitoring sensor in upcoming Apple Watch models.” This would be a noninvasive method — the Watch wouldn’t turn into a pressure cuff — so a visual sensor examining the wearer’s wrist would be involved.
We do expect new Apple Watch models in September. However, nobody except Apple execs knows if the company’s engineers nailed down the long-rumored blood pressure feature. And the event graphic surely does not indicate that Apple Watch will add a body temperature sensor. It already comes with one (beginning with Apple Watch Series 8).
Apple event graphic might not hint at anything
While some Apple event invitations graphics drop broad hints about what’s coming, they don’t all do so. Sometimes they’re just cool-looking images. That might be the case this time.
Or the colorful Apple logo could simply suggest Liquid Glass, the new design aesthetic in iOS 26, macOS 26 and other platforms. The ecosystem-wide new look brings glass-like refractions to Apple’s user interfaces.
We’ll find out for certain on September 9 when the “Awe dropping” event kicks off at 10 a.m. Pacific.
