For Stranded Deathboth phones were tested at 900p using the High preset. At the start of the run, the iPhone 18 Pro Max delivered around 40 FPS, while the iPhone 17 Pro Max was around 32-33 FPS.
The iPhone 17 Pro Max reached the “Fair” thermal state in 6 minutes and 31 seconds, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max didn’t reach the “Fair” state until 11 minutes and 27 seconds. By then, the 17 Pro Max had already transitioned to the “Serious” category, though the video doesn’t provide the exact timestamp of that transition. The 18 Pro Max didn’t reach “Serious” status until 19 minutes and 57 seconds.
After around 34 minutes and 40 seconds, the iPhone 18 Pro Max was still delivering around 37 FPS, while the iPhone 17 Pro Max had dropped to around 24.5 FPS. So, once again, the newer phone doesn’t avoid thermal throttling entirely, but it takes a lot longer to reach the same thermal states and loses a lot less performance once it gets there.
