Still sporting the 2022 iPhone 14 Pro and are debating whether it’s time to upgrade? You’ve come to the right place.

We’ve compared the specs of the iPhone 18 Pro to the iPhone 14 Pro and noted the key differences to help you decide whether you think it’s worth splurging on the newer model.

Once you’re finished here, make sure you visit our round-up of the best smartphones and best iPhones.

Specs Comparison Table

	iPhone 18 Pro	iPhone 14 Pro
Battery	Up to 36 hours video playback	Up to 23 hours video playback
Chipset	A20 Pro	A16
Rear Cameras	48MP + 48MP + 48MP	48MP + 12MP + 12MP
Screen Size	6.3-inch	6.1-inch
Charging port	USB-C	Lightning
UK RRP	£1199	Around £400 refurbished

Price and Availability

The iPhone 18 Pro is currently available to buy, with a starting price of £1199/$1199 for its 256GB handset. It also comes in a choice between four colours: Black, Silver, Glacier and Burgundy.

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As the iPhone 14 Pro launched back in 2022, it’s not surprising that it’s no longer available to buy directly from Apple. However, it is possible to find refurbished handsets on third-party sites, with the price ranging from around £300 to £400 depending on the condition.

iPhone 18 Pro runs on Apple’s most powerful chip – A20 Pro

One of the biggest differences between the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro comes under the hood. While the iPhone 18 Pro runs on Apple’s A20 Pro, a mobile chip that’s hailed as the brand’s fastest ever, the iPhone 14 Pro is powered by the four-year-old A16 Pro.

We’re yet to review the A20 Pro chip ourselves, however Apple claims it enables multi-tasking, gaming and AI tools to all run impressively quickly and smoothly, without any lag. 

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That’s not to say the iPhone 14 Pro’s A16 chip isn’t impressive. During our time with the phone, we found that it was able to comfortably play any Apple Arcade game and could even handle video exports and edits too. In fact, we concluded that there was “almost too much power here”. 

Apple Intelligence is not available on the iPhone 14 Pro

Following on from the above, while the iPhone 18 Pro’s A20 Pro chip enables the running of Apple Intelligence, the iPhone 14 Pro’s A16 doesn’t. 

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While we don’t recommend buying an iPhone purely for Apple Intelligence, as it still feels very much like an afterthought and many of its features will likely go unused, it’s undeniable that the lack of the toolkit ages the iPhone 14 Pro. 

Even so, although Apple doesn’t publicly reveal how many years of software support iPhones receive, we can guess that the iPhone 14 Pro likely has around three more years of updates. This is based on the assumption that Apple gives its iPhones seven years of updates – and that Apple has recently ceased support for the 2019 iPhone X series.

iPhone 18 Pro has Pro camera controls and variable aperture

The iPhone 18 Pro is equipped with three rear cameras, which are headlined by the 48MP fusion main lens with variable aperture. This, according to Apple, is its most “advanced camera ever made” and promises excellent performance across both bright and low lighting conditions, as it’s able to let in more or less light according to your shooting conditions. 

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Apple’s Pro controls return for the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max, which means you can customise your shooting experience. For example, you can manually adjust the aperture, the shutter speed or customise the photographic styles too.

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Although the iPhone 14 Pro also has three rear lenses albeit with different resolutions, including a 48MP main lens, 12MP ultrawide and 12MP telephoto. Overall we found the iPhone 14 Pro able to take excellent shots regardless of the lighting conditions and even stated it to be one of the best camera phones of its time. 

However, it does lack the Pro controls that the iPhone 18 Pro is fitted with. In addition, while the iPhone 18 Pro can shoot in up to 4K@120fps, the iPhone 14 Pro maxes out at 4K@60fps. Finally, the iPhone 18 Pro can reach up to 8x zoom whereas the iPhone 14 Pro reaches 3x.

iPhone 18 Pro has a slightly larger display

The age of small phones like the iPhone 13 Mini seems to be well and truly over, as the iPhone 18 Pro measures 6.3-inches compared to the iPhone 14 Pro’s 6.1-inches. Even so, both handsets are equipped with plenty of premium screen technologies including ProMotion, an always-on screen and a Dynamic Island too. 

iPhone 18 Pro has USB-C charging

Another feature that ages the iPhone 14 Pro is with its charging port. While the iPhone 18 Pro, and all other iPhones since the iPhone 15 series, has a USB-C port, the iPhone 14 Pro still uses Apple’s old Lightning port. 

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Early Verdict

The iPhone 18 Pro looks like a serious upgrade over the iPhone 14 Pro, thanks to its powerful A20 Pro chip, triple 48MP camera set-up and the inclusion of Apple Intelligence. If you want the most powerful iPhone then the 18 Pro is an easy recommendation. 

However, that doesn’t mean the iPhone 14 Pro is a bad option. In fact, its chip is still pretty powerful, its camera set-up is solid and it’s a decent size too – especially if you prefer smaller handsets. 

The system runs on Android, and much of the interface and usability will feel familiar to many. Still, dedicated apps such as Lightbox, Sequence, Cones, and Framebox let you manage and edit all the files, and in addition to these there are a few familiar apps that you can download as well, such as CapCut, Lightroom and a selection from DJI; there’s even a direct connection to Cloud Storage for additional backup.

First look: Meta is rolling out two AI-powered tools designed to make game creation for Horizon more accessible: Horizon Create, a mobile app, and Horizon Studio, a browser-based tool with more granular controls. Games made with the tools will also reach users on Facebook and Instagram. Both products will initially be available through early access, with Meta now accepting waitlist sign-ups.

The tools let creators use prompts to build 2D or 3D mobile titles. Meta said the games can include multiplayer, progression systems, art direction and difficulty balancing. Creators can also revise the games after the AI generates an initial version.

“Both enable creators to turn any idea into a complete 2D or 3D mobile game, complete with progression systems, balanced difficulty, art direction, multiplayer, and more, then refine every element to their standards,” Meta said.

Meta has not revealed how much control creators will have over the generated game logic, artwork or other technical components. But the company is still presenting the tools as a way to create full games rather than simple interactive experiments.

That is an important difference in the emerging market for AI game-development tools. Google’s Project Genie, for example, can create short interactive experiences, but Meta says Horizon Create and Horizon Studio are built to produce games with the systems that support longer play sessions.

Meta will also promote games created with the new tools across Facebook and Instagram. Titles built with Horizon Create and Horizon Studio can be recommended to users on both platforms and played directly without leaving the apps.

The company said someone viewing a game clip on Instagram could join a multiplayer game in seconds without downloading another app or being sent elsewhere. “Your game lives natively in the feeds where people already discover content and connect with friends,” Meta said.

The move also reflects Meta’s effort to make Horizon less dependent on virtual reality. Horizon began as a VR app, but Meta has recently shifted its focus to mobile access. Putting Horizon-made games inside Facebook and Instagram could expose them to a much larger audience than the Horizon platform has attracted on its own.

The company is also moving into an area where Roblox has a major advantage. The online game platform has 123 million daily active users and has been adding AI-powered creation features, including a mobile tool that lets users generate games with prompts. Horizon, in contrast, has not reached anything close to that scale.

Rush did not really become Rush on their 1974 debut. That record gave us “Working Man,” landed them a deal with Mercury Records, and proved that three young musicians from Toronto could make enough noise for Americans to pay attention, but Fly By Night is where you can hear the future taking shape.

More specifically, part of that future arrived in a Ford Pinto carrying a tall, skinny drummer with short hair and a rather unconventional method of transporting his drums. Neil Peart showed up for his July 1974 audition with his kit packed in garbage bags, which probably did not scream future Rock and Roll Hall of Famer to Alex Lifeson.

Then he sat down and played.

Peart officially joined Rush on July 29, 1974, shortly before the band began its first U.S. tour. Geddy Lee and Lifeson had already started moving toward more progressive material, but finding a drummer capable of following them there was another matter entirely.

The first thing they jammed with Peart at his audition was “Anthem.” Lee later recalled that Peart was so good that auditioning the drummer who followed him became almost painfully academic, while Lifeson remembered being struck by how active his playing was and how hard he hit the drums.

From the opening attack of “Anthem” on Fly By Night, you can hear it.

There is still plenty of Led Zeppelin and Cream in Rush’s bloodstream at this stage. Lee and Lifeson had spent their formative years learning Cream songs, and Zeppelin’s impact on the early band was hardly subtle, but Peart helped push those influences into something increasingly difficult to mistake for anybody else.

His drumming was more aggressive, intricate, and compositionally involved than what Rush had attempted on the debut. Just as importantly, his arrival encouraged Lee and Lifeson to think differently about how songs could be constructed.

The transformation is immediate. They no longer sound like some very talented guys who might still be rehearsing in a rec hall basement somewhere around Willowdale.

They are beginning to sound like Rush.

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Enter The Professor

It is almost impossible to discuss Fly By Night without turning part of the conversation into a Neil Peart story because his arrival changed far more than the drum parts.

Peart would become one of the greatest rock drummers of his generation, but reducing his contribution to his playing ability misses half of what made him so important to Rush. He was private and introverted by nature, a voracious reader, intellectually curious to an almost intimidating degree, and unusually articulate when he decided he had something worth saying.

Lee and Lifeson quickly discovered something else useful about their new drummer: he liked words.

They did not particularly enjoy writing lyrics, and Peart did. He eventually became Rush’s principal lyricist, immediately expanding the band’s universe beyond much of the conventional rock subject matter heard on the debut.

Peart wrote the lyrics for six of the eight songs on Fly By Night. “Best I Can” and “In the End” originated before he joined, which makes the album an especially interesting transitional document because pieces of the previous Rush exist alongside material pointing directly toward what followed.

“Beneath, Between & Behind” was the first lyric Peart wrote for the band. “Rivendell,” inspired by Tolkien, could hardly be further removed from the lyrical world of “Need Some Love,” while the title track drew from Peart’s own experience leaving Canada for England when he was eighteen.

Fantasy, literature, travel, individualism, philosophy and eventually science fiction were entering the building. Rush suddenly had considerably more to talk about.

Still Zeppelin And Cream But Becoming Rush

It would be revisionist nonsense to pretend that Fly By Night emerged fully formed as the classic Rush sound. The heavy blues and British hard rock influences remain obvious, particularly the impact of Led Zeppelin and Cream that helped shape Lee and Lifeson long before Peart appeared.

What changes is what Rush begin doing with those ingredients.

Peart’s rhythmic vocabulary gives Lifeson more room to fracture riffs, change direction, and think beyond straightforward hard rock arrangements. Lee’s bass playing becomes more active because it has a drummer capable of meeting him practically anywhere, and the three musicians begin functioning less like guitar, bass, and drums occupying separate lanes and more like three lead players somehow negotiating the same piece of road.

That interplay would eventually become one of the defining characteristics of Rush.

You can hear its beginnings all over Fly By Night. The music becomes tighter even as the arrangements become more ambitious, and the band sounds considerably more confident taking risks that might have collapsed with a less capable rhythm section.

Peart did not erase their influences overnight. He helped provide the foundation that allowed Rush to stop merely reflecting them.

By-Tor Opens The Door

Nothing on Fly By Night points toward the next decade more clearly than “By-Tor and the Snow Dog.”

The 8:37 four-part composition grew from an inside joke involving two dogs belonging to manager Ray Danniels, but Peart transformed that silliness into a good-versus-evil fantasy populated by Prince By-Tor, the Snow Dog, the River Styx, battles, and enough sword-waving imagery to frighten an FM program director.

Lifeson later described it as the first time Rush attempted a multipart piece of music. That makes it far more important than its wonderfully ridiculous origins suggest.

The basic idea would rapidly expand.

Caress of Steel followed later in 1975 with “The Necromancer” and the nearly twenty-minute “The Fountain of Lamneth.” Then came the side-long title suite on 2112, followed by “Cygnus X-1” and “Xanadu” on A Farewell to Kings and the even more elaborate material on Hemispheres.

“For my money, “Xanadu” remains one of the greatest songs Rush ever recorded. At more than eleven minutes, it is atmospheric, thunderous, technically ridiculous, and gives all three musicians enough room to demonstrate precisely why nobody ever needed a fourth member.

It is also easy to draw the line backward from “Xanadu” to “By-Tor.” The latter sounds like three young musicians realizing they can stretch a rock song into something larger; the former sounds like three masters who know exactly how to control the scale, dynamics, pacing, and drama of a long-form composition.

Watching Anika Nilles play “Xanadu” with Lee and Lifeson on the 2026 Fifty Something tour brought all the feels for me. Hearing those opening swells again and watching another extraordinary drummer navigate Peart’s parts was a reminder that this particular branch of the Rush family tree began more than five decades earlier with songs like “By-Tor.”

It Almost Went Down The Tubes

There is an important wrinkle in the story because Rush’s march toward progressive rock was hardly greeted by record company executives throwing rose petals at their feet.

Fly By Night gave the band confidence to push further, and Caress of Steel pushed much further. Perhaps too far, at least commercially.

Released only seven months after Fly By Night, Caress of Steel devoted much of its running time to “The Necromancer” and “The Fountain of Lamneth.” Those extended pieces offered little help to conventional radio programmers, audiences did not respond the way the band expected, and the resulting tour became grim enough that Rush jokingly called it the Down the Tubes Tour.

The joke had teeth.

Peart later recalled that Caress of Steel had not actually sold dramatically fewer copies than the preceding records, but Mercury was in turmoil and three albums selling roughly 100,000 copies each did not exactly make Rush untouchable. Lee and Lifeson have both described how disappointing and confusing the response was, with the band genuinely concerned about where things were headed.

The record company subsequently advised Rush not to make another concept album.

Rush responded by making 2112.

That decision might be the most Rush thing Rush ever did.

Instead of retreating toward three-minute singles, the band opened its next album with a seven-part science-fiction suite lasting more than twenty minutes. 2112 became their commercial breakthrough and effectively earned Lee, Lifeson, and Peart the freedom to chart their own course for the rest of their career.

The progression matters when listening to Fly By Night. “By-Tor” was not just some eccentric deep cut about two dogs given mythological identities after somebody had a laugh on the road; it was the first significant step down a musical path that nearly destroyed their career before becoming the reason they had one.

Rivendell And The Other Side Of Peart

“Rivendell” demonstrates that Peart’s impact was not simply about longer songs, heavier drumming, or fitting more notes into every available square inch.

Inspired by J.R.R. Tolkien, the song strips away most of the force heard elsewhere on Fly By Night. There is no percussion, the presentation is largely acoustic, and its almost pastoral quality provided Rush with an early opportunity to explore texture and mood instead of simply seeing how hard they could hit the listener.

The literary direction is unmistakable.

Peart’s reading habits would continue to influence his lyrics for decades, but Fly By Night is where listeners first encountered just how broad his frame of reference could become. Fantasy and mythology were part of it, but they were never the entire picture.

The title track proves that.

“Fly By Night” grew from Peart’s experience leaving Canada as a young man for England, giving the album something personal and autobiographical alongside the fantasy. That combination of internal reflection and enormous fictional landscapes would become another Peart trademark.

One minute Rush could be contemplating Rivendell. A few years later they would be flying into a black hole.

Perfectly normal Canadian behavior.

The Mobile Fidelity Edition

Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab has now returned to Fly By Night as part of its Rush reissue campaign covering the band’s studio catalog from 1974 through 1985.

The numbered edition spreads the album across two 180-gram LPs cut at 45 RPM and carries a $59.99 price. Mobile Fidelity says Krieg Wunderlich mastered the release using the original 1/4-inch, 15 IPS analog master with the following chain:

1/4-inch 15 IPS analog master → DSD 256 → analog console → lathe

The records are pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing and packaged in a Stoughton gatefold jacket with a bonus photo print.

So no, this is not an AAA release.

The debut certainly benefited from Mobile Fidelity’s treatment. My review copy of the 45 RPM Rush offered considerably greater tonal weight, bass impact, and overall substance than the other pressings in my collection, even if no mastering engineer was going to magically turn the album into Moving Pictures or even Power Windows.

Fly By Night presents a much more interesting challenge.

Neil Peart is the first thing you notice, and on this pressing his impact is impossible to miss.

His drumming hits harder on this pressing, but sheer impact is only part of it. There is considerably more definition around his playing, and the increased clarity makes his precision much easier to follow. That matters on Fly By Night because Peart is already doing things rhythmically that separate this band from the one that recorded the debut. MoFi does not make the performance sound artificially larger; it simply makes it easier to hear how much Peart had changed the foundation underneath Lee and Lifeson.

That added clarity also benefits Alex Lifeson. His guitar playing has more edge and presence, with greater separation from Lee’s bass and Peart’s drums. There is more information around the notes, particularly when the arrangements get busier, and that gives the album a degree of scale and control that I have not always heard from other versions.

“By-Tor and the Snow Dog” benefits enormously. The different sections have more presence, the transitions feel more deliberate, and the instrumental passages carry considerably more weight. You can hear the three musicians beginning to understand what they could accomplish when nobody was telling them that a rock song needed to be four minutes long and finished before the radio programmer reached for the phone.

It is not “Xanadu.”

That song, especially on a really capable system, can become absolutely enormous in the room. The opening atmosphere, Lifeson’s guitar, Lee’s bass and keyboards, and Peart’s percussion build into something almost physical. All three musicians get to demonstrate what they had become by A Farewell to Kings, and it remains one of my favorite Rush tracks, period. Knowing that Mobile Fidelity has an UltraDisc One-Step edition of that album coming has me more than a little curious about what they are going to do with it.

But Fly By Night is the beginning of that journey, and the MoFi pressing does a very good job of making the connection clearer.

“Rivendell,” however, remains “Rivendell.”

The additional resolution does not suddenly push Geddy forward in the mix. If anything, greater clarity makes me wish somebody had turned up his microphone or asked him to remove the Cott Black Cherry from his mouth before Terry Brown hit record. Considering that Pancer’s on Bathurst was already feeding Toronto and had its own connection to Rush, I can picture the entire scenario rather too easily.

Swallow, Gershon. Swallow.

That quirk aside, Mobile Fidelity has done a really solid job with Fly By Night. There is more weight, greater definition, stronger instrumental separation, and enough additional clarity to reveal just how quickly Rush were evolving once Peart joined the band. Most importantly, none of that comes at the expense of the energy that makes the album work.

The $59.99 asking price is not insignificant, especially if you already own multiple copies, but this is not one of those audiophile reissues where you have to convince yourself that the triangle sounded slightly more dimensional at 2:47.

The improvement is easy to hear.

For Rush fans with a good analog setup, the Mobile Fidelity 45 RPM edition of Fly By Night is definitely worth buying. It gives Peart’s arrival the weight and precision it deserves, gives Lifeson’s guitar more bite, and lets “By-Tor” stretch its legs without pretending this 1975 recording is something it was never meant to be.

Call it a definite two-four from The Beer Store.

None of that fancy LCBO stuff.

Our Ratings

★★★★★★★★★★ Music

★★★★★★★★★★ Sound

★★★★★★★★★★ Packaging

Where to Buy

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One of the biggest roadblocks for adding countertop appliances to your kitchen is storage. For folks with a small kitchen, myself included, the struggle often looks like a constant shuffle, trading one appliance for another in the pantry. This problem is less noticeable in larger kitchens, but you might end up with more clutter than you’d like.

Eventually, you need to decide if you’ll use an appliance often enough to justify getting it. In my case, I’m much more likely to choose a multipurpose product like an Instant Pot pressure cooker or an air fryer. Perhaps this is why I was excited to test out the Ninja CrushBoss, which combines a large blender, food processor and small smoothie blender into a single device. I spent the two weeks using a sample unit from Ninja in my kitchen, and I’m eager to share my thoughts. 

Four appliances in one. Well, kind of

CrushBoss isn’t Ninja’s first attempt at an all-in-one kitchen system, as the Ninja Detect, Ninja Professional Plus and Ninja Foodi Power Blender all attempt similar feats. What sets Ninja CrushBoss apart are the PrecisionDice and MultiBlade Disc attachments for the food processor bowl, plus a better smoothie tumbler design than previous models.

Similarly, the blender’s preset programs change depending on which vessel you attach to the 1850-watt base motor, with each program running automatically to achieve the desired results. You can rotate the outer ring of the small LCD screen to choose your setting, then make the final selection by pressing the top of the screen inward to click. It’s not a touchscreen, but it’s easy enough to use once you learn the controls.

There isn’t much that’s special about the large blender pitcher, which uses largely the same design as other standalone Ninja blenders. It comes with a single blade assembly and presets for mincing, small chopping and large chopping. The smoothie tumbler is similarly simple, with its small blade assembly supporting ice crushing, blending and smoothie presets. Compared to older tumblers, the Travel Tumbler’s main upgrade is a better carrying handle, flip-top lid and a large smoothie straw — it’s more like a Stanley cup than a NutriBullet personal blender.

Last, but not least, is the food processor, which has the most accessories, including a chopping blade, dough blade, MultiBlade Disc and the PrecisionDice assembly. Where the Ninja Detect’s food processor included reversible stainless steel discs, the MultiBlade attachment is largely plastic, with specific inserts depending on the model you choose. The model I tested came with inserts for thick slices, crinkle-cut slices and shredding — Ninja also sells inserts for thin slices, french fries and julienning.

I call it a kind of four-in-one appliance because the smoothie tumbler’s main benefits are, naturally, smoother blending consistency than the large pitcher and greater travel portability with the included lid and smoothie straw. You can still use the large pitcher for family-size smoothies and anything too big for the other two vessels, so adding a blending function to each vessel is largely superfluous. Similarly, the dicing kit is hardly an appliance on its own, since you’ll see it on other food processor brands like KitchenAid and Breville.

How useful is the Ninja CrushBoss?

Of the three vessels, I spent the most time with the food processor. I used the PrecisionDice attachment to prepare a fruit salad, which went very smoothly and had no issues with mango, watermelon, strawberries and pineapple. I pureed some blackberries with the food processor’s chopping blade to add more texture to the salad, though the smoothie attachment was ultimately a better option for crushing the blackberry seeds.

Next, I swapped the dicing attachment for the MultiBlade and sliced potatoes and cucumbers with the normal and crinkle-cut attachments. Again, the results were very good. Things were a little less consistent when I processed carrots and cabbage with the shredder for a quick coleslaw, as some bits of each remained unprocessed between the blade and lid. The amount of unprocessed vegetables was minimal, so I tossed them into a bowl of ramen instead of manually chopping them for the coleslaw.

To give the food processor a proper workout, I brought out the cheddar cheese, which I put through the shredder, slicer and dicer. As you might suspect, the cheese worked best with the shredder, with very little waste and no clogs. The other two attachments are less suitable for cheese, with the slicing disc producing passable slices. However, I clogged the dicing tool when I tried to make cheese cubes. I ultimately succeeded with some tiny cubes, but I don’t recommend it. 

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While I didn’t use the dough blade attachment much, it seemed good for mixing bread dough into a state where I could knead it by hand. I ran three cycles using the dough preset — though I admit the last cycle was because I forgot to add an ingredient. One reason I finished by hand was that I could hear the motor straining a bit toward the end of the second and third cycles.

I suspect the CrushBoss can handle the job, as the manual says it can hold up to 2 pounds of dough and shut off if necessary, but it took only a minute of hand-kneading after processing to reach the consistency I wanted. My advice: Listen to your machine and avoid tasks that trigger the auto-shutoff too often. Fortunately, my testing didn’t surface any problems with the system’s durability.

Beyond the food processor bowl, little stood out about the blender pitcher and smoothie tumbler attachments. Each did well with various levels of blending, pureeing and ice crushing, but nothing so outstanding that my ancient Oster blender couldn’t also do. The biggest advantages over my modest blender are the pitcher’s size — even if it’s more than I need in my kitchen — and the tumbler’s portability. Ninja says CrushBoss isn’t suitable for hot blending, so you can’t safely use it with hot liquids.

The challenge of modular kitchen systems like Ninja CrushBoss

Although I’m happy that I don’t have to store three motorized bases for separate specialty appliances, all of Ninja’s vessels and attachments are bulky enough that they’d take up an entire shelf in my kitchen cabinets. There’s not really a safe way to store the extremely sharp food processor discs, so I ultimately kept them in a carrying case for a massage gun I threw out ages ago. Fortunately, you can safely store the largest blender blade assemblies in each vessel.

The other challenge is that while all of the attachments are dishwasher-safe, that only applies to the top rack. My older dishwasher’s top rack isn’t adjustable, so I can’t fit any of the vessels inside and I have to wash them all by hand. This isn’t a problem I experience with the glass jar of my Oster blender, or the slightly smaller vessel of the Tribest Backspin I tested in 2025. At least the other parts fit, which made cleanup much more manageable.

My point in calling these out isn’t to discourage anyone interested in the CrushBoss, but to note that storage space and dishwasher space still matter before you buy.

Should you buy the Ninja CrushBoss?

As I used the Ninja CrushBoss 4-in-1, I kept coming back to one central question: “Who is this for?” Ultimately, it’s a harder question to answer than I thought. I have no problem recommending each function separately — blending, smoothies, dicing and food processing — because it seems to do all of these well enough.

For example, this particular setup should work well for two types of households: large families and meal preppers. I grew up in a large family, and having an appliance to prepare a huge amount of ingredients for every meal is a no-brainer. Another group that might benefit is the meal-prepper, regardless of household size.

Still, selling everything together in a single kit is excessive for someone like me, who has a small apartment. I have plenty of travel cups for smoothies and rarely need to process large amounts of food. Ninja thankfully offers various CrushBoss configurations and will most likely sell the attachments separately down the line, like with its older products. Personally, I’d love a configuration with only a large pitcher and food processor — I don’t need a smoothie tumbler.

At $320, the Ninja CrushBoss 4-in-1 costs about what you’d pay for separate Ninja appliances, but it is pricier than previous generations of Ninja’s modular kitchen systems, even without the dicing kit. This is a drop in the bucket compared to getting similar attachments for a Vitamix Ascent X. Despite my personal reservations, I think the Ninja CrushBoss 4-in-1 is a great idea, especially for folks looking to consolidate multiple specialty appliances into a single modular system. It taps into the reason why people love the classic KitchenAid stand mixer, and that’s a good thing.

John Carlsen has more than a decade of experience testing and reviewing home tech products, with a major focus on smart home security. He earned his BS in journalism from Utah Valley University. In addition to his CNET contributions, John has written for Android Police, TWICE, Home Theater Review, SafeWise, ASecureLife and Top Ten Reviews.

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Anthropic will spend $11.6 billion over seven years on Akamai’s cloud infrastructure, Akamai said Thursday. That’s more than six times the size of a $1.8 billion deal between the two companies that Bloomberg reported in May. The commitment isn’t ironclad; according to Akamai’s securities filing, it depends on Akamai meeting certain delivery and service-availability requirements, and either company can end the agreement under certain conditions.

The deal is the largest in Akamai’s history and continues Anthropic’s compute gobbling-streak. It also represents a bet on a less-hyped corner of AI infrastructure: CPUs. Demand for CPUs, the general-purpose chips that handle work like running code and browsing the web, has grown as AI agents take on more tasks, though Akamai didn’t say what Anthropic will use them for. 

Akamai won’t see revenue from the deal this year. On an investor call Thursday, executives said they expect $150 million to $300 million in 2027, starting in the second half, with revenue reaching an annual pace of about $1.7 billion by the end of 2028. 

To build out the capacity, Akamai expects to spend about $5.5 billion. It is also adding about $1.7 billion to this year’s capital spending to buy components such as memory in advance. 

As part of the deal, Akamai issued Anthropic a warrant, essentially the right to buy shares at a set price, for nonvoting preferred stock convertible into 7.7 million common shares, or up to about 5% of the company’s outstanding stock, at $111.33 a share. About 2% is expected to vest, or become available to Anthropic once it makes its first payment under the deal. The rest is tied to Anthropic spending more. Each additional $3 billion it commits to Akamai’s cloud services unlocks roughly another 1%, so the deal could grow by as much as $9 billion, to about $20 billion in total.

It’s the first time Akamai has attached a warrant to a cloud deal, and the contract is the largest in company history, Bloomberg reported.

The warrant flips the more common pattern in circular AI deals, in which suppliers — chipmakers and cloud providers — invest directly in the AI labs that buy their products. Here, the supplier is instead giving its customer a potential stake, one that grows as Anthropic’s spending with Akamai does. AMD used a similar structure with OpenAI last year, tying warrants to chip-purchase milestones. 

Anthropic is no stranger to such arrangements. Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and AMD have all invested or agreed to invest in the company while selling it chips or cloud capacity. CEO Dario Amodei told The New York Times last December that Anthropic does not participate in these deals at the “same scale as some other players.”

Akamai shares rose as much as 17% in after-hours trading on Thursday, The Wall Street Journal reported.