STOCKHOLM — An iPhone 17 Pro has survived an extraordinary fall from more than 100,000 feet above Earth, helping set a Guinness World Record after the device was recovered without damage and remained operational.
The record attempt was carried out by mobile accessories company RHINOSHIELD in collaboration with UK-based Sent Into Space in Kiruna, Sweden.
According to Guinness World Records, the phone was dropped from an altitude of 30,607 metres, or 100,418 feet and 8 inches, establishing the record for the highest drop of a mobile phone in a phone case over natural landforms.
The height was more than three times the typical cruising altitude of commercial passenger aircraft and more than three times the height of Mount Everest.
The iPhone 17 Pro was protected by RHINOSHIELD's AirX phone case during the extreme durability experiment.
A high-altitude balloon carried the equipment towards the stratosphere before the phone was released for its descent.
The experiment subjected the device to extreme environmental conditions in addition to the impact itself, putting both the smartphone and protective case through a test far beyond an ordinary accidental drop.
Remarkably, the phone survived.
After being recovered, the device was tested and found to remain functional, including its calling, photography and touchscreen capabilities. No visible damage was reported to the protective case.
Guinness World Records officially recognised RHINOSHIELD and Sent Into Space for the achievement.
The experiment was designed primarily to demonstrate the impact resistance of the AirX protective case rather than suggest that an unprotected iPhone could withstand such an extreme fall.
RHINOSHIELD said the case uses a mono-material design intended to combine impact protection with recyclability.
The record adds an unusual chapter to smartphone durability testing, taking the familiar phone-drop experiment from a few feet above the ground to the edge of the stratosphere.