Apple's waterproof iPhone 7 to ditch the headphone jack

According to industry sources, Apple has applied for a patent called "Electronics Devices with Housing Port Shutters". This unique patent aims at sealing off all ports and body of the phone to protect it from the entry of moisture or liquids.

This technology determines that the ports of the phone remain shut until there is a direct use for them. For example, the speaker shutters would shut if the sensors pick up any kind of moisture or in case of call or message, the shutters would open to convey the sound, keeping the phone protected from external agents at other times. As a result we can expect iPhone 7, to come without an ear phone jack.

In addition, Mac Otakara, a Japanese website, reports that the Apple do away with the 3.5mm audio jack to make the iPhone 7 slimmer. For this Apple is working on a new Lightning connector which will support Lightning equipped headphones. The port is said to retain the same size, and will also come with a digital to analogue converter for backwards compatibility with wired headphones. Users would require 3.5mm jack-to-lightning adapter for this.

Apple is also also to release Lightning-equipped EarPods bundled with the iPhone 7, which will be sold separately for use with other iOS devices.

At this point all this is just a rumor and a lot of changes can be expected between now and the launch, especially since it happening H2 2016.