Liveblog Recap: Apple September Event 2026

Early Thursday morning, September 10, 2026 (1:00 AM PH time), Apple held its September event, dubbed “Surprise and Shine” — and it lived up to the name. It was a milestone keynote: the first one led by John Ternus as Apple CEO. The Gadget Pilipinas team (Giancarlo Viterbo, Emman Tortoza, Jimm Gayo, and Luie Magbanua) covered the event live, minute by minute, and by the time the stream wrapped up just after 2:20 AM, Apple had revealed the iPhone 18 Pro series, AirPods 5, the Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4 — and, as the “one more thing,” Apple’s long-rumored first foldable: the iPhone Duo.

Here is everything announced, as covered in our live coverage.

iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max

Apple opened the Pro segment with the A20 Pro, its new 2nm chip with a 6-core CPU that Apple says is up to 20 percent faster — powerful enough that the live team noted you can now run third-party LLMs on the phone. Apple paired it with next-generation vapor chamber cooling and a heavy emphasis on thermal management, calling the gains “giant leaps in sustained performance.” The two models come in 6.9-inch and 6.3-inch sizes with a new Burgundy colorway joining the lineup.

On the camera side, the headline is a 48MP Fusion main camera with variable aperture, joined by a 4x/8x Fusion Telephoto setup, new Pro Controls, Photographic Styles with texture control, and the ability to pull cinematic-style footage from regular video. Video shooters also get smart focus tracking that follows a subject, and 4K resolution for time-lapse is now available. The Dynamic Island has been redesigned to show more information at a glance.

Apple also touted the best battery life ever on an iPhone Pro, faster wired charging, and a Monster Hunter Outlanders demo to show off the graphics muscle. Pricing starts at USD 1,199 for the iPhone 18 Pro and USD 1,299 for the iPhone 18 Pro Max, now with up to 2TB of storage.

“My wallet is not readyyyyyyy” — Luie Magbanua, during the Pro segment (1:04 AM PH)

Siri AI, the Apple Foundation, and iOS 27

The keynote leaned hard into Apple’s AI push, with “Siri AI” branding appearing throughout. In a notable moment, the live team flagged that Apple’s new Apple Foundation AI platform is actually powered by Google — a topic Gadget Pilipinas has covered in depth, including why Apple chose Google for Siri.

GP has also been testing the iOS 27 public beta for months now, and the team shared that Siri is noticeably better in the new software — though one slide got a laugh: Siri’s language list still doesn’t include Filipino.

AirPods 5

Surprising no one who watched the rumors, AirPods 5 made their debut — and the price drew the biggest reaction of the segment. AirPods 5 start at USD 129, with the ANC model — even the version with a wireless charging case — drawing an “ang mura!” from the live team.

“Huy, ang mura ng AirPods 5 ANC. Even the one with a wireless charging case.” — Jimm Gayo (1:36 AM PH)

Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4

Apple introduced the Apple Watch Series 12 powered by the S11 chip, which the team called Apple’s most powerful wearable chip yet. New software features include Audio Intelligence, Live Rewind (for replaying things you didn’t catch the first time), and Siri Recap. On the health side, the Series 12 adds a Readiness metric and Health Age, tracks HRV in Vitals, and performs heart-rate checks far more frequently — with Apple claiming the most accurate heart-rate sensing in a wearable. The frequent checks did spark one concern in the live chat, though: battery life.

“The higher frequency of checks the new Apple Watch Series 12 does for the heart is good, but kind of concerns me sa battery life.” — Jimm Gayo (1:42 AM PH)

Also new for the Series 12: Ceramic Shield 2, ceramic band options, and faster charging. Notably, there are no price changes for the watches this year. The Apple Watch Ultra 4 also arrived, starting at USD 799.

iPhone Duo: Apple’s first foldable

Then came the moment everyone stayed up for. Just before 2 AM PH, the team spotted the tell-tale signs — “What is this, John!?” and “Ayan na yung foldable!!” — and Apple delivered the iPhone Duo as its “one more thing.” It’s Apple’s first foldable: a book-style device with a 7.6-inch inner display and a 5.4-inch cover display — the largest iPhone display ever, in Apple’s thinnest iPhone body yet. It comes in Star White and Night Sky colors, built from Grade 5 titanium with Ceramic Shield 2 on both front and back.

Inside is the same A20 Pro chip, which Apple says complements the Duo’s display technology, with all-day battery life and improved power efficiency. The camera system pairs a 48MP Dual Fusion setup with a Center Stage front camera, plus a Smart Take feature that automatically captures group shots for you.

Some of the night’s biggest reactions came from the Duo’s versatility: it supports the Apple Pencil, has a partially folded mode that the team called “FLEX MODE perfected” (with Zoom and Slack already supporting it), routes audio from both sides even when unfolded to fix the classic foldable speaker problem, and can run dual FaceTime with a dual preview. A demo of the game UnGodly showed off its gaming chops.

“I’M SO GETTING THIS!” — Giancarlo Viterbo, at the iPhone Duo reveal (1:55 AM PH)

“HOW THIN IS IT” / “PENGE PERA HAHAHUHU” — Luie Magbanua (1:56–1:59 AM PH)

One important note for buyers: the iPhone Duo is eSIM-only worldwide. It starts at USD 1,999 and is available October 23 in the US — so a Philippine release will likely follow in November.

Wrap-up

The event wrapped just after 2:18 AM PH — “Awesome!!! Thanks, John! What a blast!” — with the iPhone 18 Pro series, AirPods 5, Apple Watch Series 12, Apple Watch Ultra 4, and the iPhone Duo all officially on the board for 2026. Check out our full Apple September Event 2026 live coverage for the complete minute-by-minute transcript, and stay tuned for Philippine pricing and availability updates.