I have a FineWoven case on my 15 Pro Max and, just adding to the anecdata here, have not had a single thermal issue. The only time it warmed up was during the initial data transfer. I'm pushing the phone with a lot of cinematic video recording, etc – remarkably cool.

I watched this story blossom out of a few social accounts I had to mute because it started to feel like they really wanted to get likes on 'iPhone 15 Pro Max is a disaster' type posts.

That's the tricky thing about the information environment we're in. A real issue affecting people? Or a non-issue that's being boosted and then picked up into a bigger story. Devices sometimes have issues – not debating that. Just saying, I feel like there's been very little skepticism applied here.

I agree. Especially since this can make very easy clickbait headlines.

I mean it has blown up enough that even my mom texted me “your dad read an article about the iPhone 15 heating up”. Lovely.

Same here. 15 pro max and all is smooth sailing. Worst I had it was tethered to a laptop running zoom and a pc running another zoom with the phone charging. It had to stop charging at 80% for thermal protection.

When the biggest complaints about a device are like this I feel good about the purchase.

Same here. The only time my phone gets reliably toasty is when recording a very long video at 4K 60 fps. That’s it.

Same! I noticed that with my previous iPhone also.

Related question (if you see this). I have started just cranking down the AC when I need to record something. Since annoyingly the iPhone will just stop recording with no notification. So if I have my phone mounted I may just loose some recording. Have you found a solution to this by chance?

I think the only real solution to this is to use a different, non-phone, device. Consider that the latest GoPro experiences the same problem when recording best-quality video.

Active cooling would probably work — something like a fan blowing directly at your phone — but I don’t think changing the ambient air temperature will be sufficient. (Unless the change is enormous, like recording outdoors in the winter.) Also, make sure your phone is not in a case. Of course, you could always record lower quality video. But that’s not really a solution.

I just wish it would alert me somehow without needing to see the screen or risk an alert going off while recording.

Like I get it needing to stop.

I tried the other camera route, the lower light performance was abysmal. Now I was going for a higher end webcam route that was good for YouTube. But it was shockingly bad compared to my iPhone. And I have a good amount of light, it was just that grainy look on blacks that really bothered me.

I am also just not really in a position to spend over $1k on a camera when for the most part my phone works if I could just get past one pesky little detail.