Color palette on iPhone 18 Pro Max, Samsung has been available since 2022
(Dan Tri) - The four colors on this year's iPhone 18 Pro remind many people of the Galaxy S22 Ultra from 4 years ago. However, this similarity does not mean that Apple has "copied" Samsung.
Apple this year brought a seemingly small but quite noticeable change to the iPhone 18 Pro Max line. Instead of the relatively safe color options often found on the Pro Max line, the company offers 4 versions including black, silver, Glacier and Burgundy red.
Apple has added many color options to this year's iPhone 18 Pro Max, in which Burgundy red and Glacier blue are two attention-grabbing versions (Photo: AI, Doan Thuy).
Among them, Burgundy and Bang Thanh are the two options that attract the most attention. Burgundy red is a fairly dark and deep wine red, while Bang Thanh is a light blue tone, leaning toward a pastel style and changing color depending on lighting conditions.
However, when placing all four versions side by side, Apple's new color palette brings a quite familiar feeling.
Samsung has had this color palette since 4 years ago
Back in February 2022, Samsung introduced the Galaxy S22 Ultra with 4 standard colors including Phantom Black, Phantom White, Green and Burgundy. Particularly on the online store, the company added Graphite, Red and Sky Blue.
If you choose some of these versions to place next to the iPhone 18 Pro, the similarities are quite interesting.
Galaxy S22 Ultra has had similar colors since 2022. In particular, Sky Blue is the color version exclusively distributed by Samsung on the online store (Photo: AI, Doan Thuy).
Black on iPhone can be placed next to Phantom Black. Burgundy is even the name used by both Apple and Samsung.
The Bang Thanh of the iPhone 18 Pro is also reminiscent of Sky Blue, which Samsung once sold exclusively online.
Meanwhile, Silver and Phantom White are not the same color but both serve as the neutral, brightest options in the two color palettes.
The 4 colors of the iPhone 18 Pro Max in 2026 have many similarities with the color options that appeared on the Galaxy S22 Ultra 4 years ago (Graphics: AI, Doan Thuy).
If you only look at the color boxes instead of the phone's shape, Apple's 2026 flagship color palette seems to have been "previewed" by Samsung 4 years ago.
In fact, images comparing two generations being shared on social networks can easily cause misunderstandings. Galaxy S22 Ultra is not sold by Samsung at the same time with exactly 4 colors: black, white, Burgundy and Sky Blue as a standard color set.
Phantom Black, Phantom White and Burgundy belong to the popular color group of the Galaxy S22 Ultra, while Sky Blue is an exclusive color on the Samsung website in Vietnam. Samsung also listed the S22 Ultra Online Exclusive version with three colors Graphite, Red and Sky Blue.
Therefore, it can be said that colors similar to the iPhone 18 Pro have existed on the Galaxy S22 Ultra, but combining them into a complete 4-color palette is a fun visual comparison, not the official color palette Samsung announced when launching the device.
More importantly, there is no basis to conclude from this similarity that Apple took color ideas from Samsung. Black, white, silver, wine red or light blue are not exclusive colors in the phone industry.
The recent story happened with iPhone Duo
Similar colors are not enough to conclude which company got the idea from which company. In fact, Apple itself recently revealed an interesting story about the line between "thinking first" and "launching first" during the development of the iPhone Duo.
According to PhoneArena, one of the reasons why Apple waited so long to enter the folding phone market is the screen fold. The company wants the interior screen to appear flat when opened, but current technological limitations do not allow for the crease to be completely eliminated.
The turning point came when Apple tested a nano texture coating on the internal screen. When Apple CEO John Ternus and leaders saw this technology in action, they thought the product had reached the right time for commercialization.
Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing, said the company is especially proud of keeping this coating a secret. People who know about the technology inside Apple even use a codename that Joswiak and Ternus have not disclosed.
iPhone Duo marks the first time Apple has entered the folding screen phone market after many years of product research and development (Photo: Future).
The reason Apple is so cautious is also quite interesting.
According to PhoneArena, Joz admitted that the screen ratio of the iPhone Duo was leaked before the device was released.
Apple therefore does not want the same thing to happen with the nano texture coating, which it considers one of the important differences of the first folding iPhone.
That doesn't mean the folding phones that appeared before the iPhone Duo copied Apple. And vice versa, two products that look similar is not enough to conclude that one company "learns" from the other.
The similarity in color does not mean that Apple copied Samsung, because many color tones on the phone can repeat with each product cycle (Photo: Tuan Anh).
Back to the iPhone 18 Pro Max, there is no evidence that Apple has planned Burgundy or Bang Thanh since 2022, and there is no basis to believe that Samsung ever knew Apple's color palette in advance.
The explanation is probably much simpler. Color trends on phones are always cyclical. Colors that were once popular may disappear for a few years and then return under different names, materials and surface treatments.
However, when placing the 2022 Galaxy S22 Ultra next to the 2026 iPhone 18 Pro, the coincidence is still interesting enough to make technology users take a second look.