I believe that's more an issue with the SoC not supporting USB 3. If the iPhone 15 base models re-use the same SoC as the iPhone 14 Pro (like the base iPhone 14

I believe that's more an issue with the SoC not supporting USB 3. If the iPhone 15 base models re-use the same SoC as the iPhone 14 Pro (like the base iPhone 14s do), then those SoCs were probably never developed to support USB 3 in the first place. They've previously used external USB 3 host controllers to support USB 3 host, but not client. I believe the iPad Mini 6, and the iPad Air 4 both do this: https://unitedlex.com/insights/apple-ipad-2020-teardown-analysis/ https://unitedlex.com/insights/apple-ipad-2020-teardown-anal... . So while the product specs will say USB 3.1 and that is technically true, it'll only be for USB devices, not for a connection to a computer: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/ipad-mini-6-is-still-usb2-0-when-connect-to-mac.2313014/ https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/ipad-mini-6-is-still-us... . Adding that USB 3 host in an iPhone would be a bit pointless: I doubt anyone is going to hook up a USB drive to their phone. Funny enough I had this idea because the Raspberry Pi 4 does the same thing: SoC that only supports a USB 2.0 client while using an external USB 3.0 host controller.