A new rumor suggests the iPhone could lose its dedicated Action button next year, with Apple folding its job into the Camera Control button instead. The claim is unconfirmed, and Apple has not commented on it.
According to MacRumors, the report comes from a leaker who goes by Instant Digital, posting on Weibo. The leaker says Apple plans to merge the two controls, so that a single button handles both camera access and the customizable shortcut the Action button provides today.
How the merged button would work
As described in the rumor, a single press of the combined button would open the camera. A longer press would run whichever function the user has assigned to the Action button, such as a Focus mode, the flashlight or a Shortcut. The standalone Action button would disappear, while Camera Control would stay on the device's side.
The Action button first arrived on the iPhone 15 Pro in 2023, where it replaced the traditional ring/silent switch. Camera Control followed later as a separate hardware control for the camera.
Timing and models
MacRumors says the change would begin with iPhone models released in the second half of 2027. The outlet presumes that points to the 20th-anniversary iPhone lineup expected in the fall of 2027, but notes that this is its own inference rather than something the leaker stated. It also points out that the naming of those devices is unclear.
Reasons for caution
This is a single-source leak. MacRumors calls the idea plausible given how the two controls already work, but it has not confirmed the claim independently. The report also notes that Camera Control's long-press gesture currently opens Visual Intelligence, which has been folded into the Camera app as a Siri mode in iOS 27. In MacRumors' view, that could free Apple to reassign the gesture, though that reasoning is the outlet's own and not part of the leak.
It also remains unclear whether this rumor relates to an earlier claim about a redesigned Camera Control for the iPhone 18, which MacRumors says did not materialize. The two claims are separate.
For context, Apple's iPhone Duo already ships without an Action button while keeping Camera Control, according to MacRumors.
Apple typically does not comment on unreleased hardware, so any change to the iPhone's buttons will only be confirmed when the company announces new models.
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