Elon Musk posted a number of comments that implied criticism of Apple’s iPhone 16 development team, especially regarding the design.

When Apple announced the iPhone 16 on September 9, Elon Musk did not post anything on his personal page, but he actively responded to articles related to the new smartphone. For example, when an X user commented: “iPhone 16: same phone, just two new buttons and a new color”, Musk commented: “For only $50 billion in R&D, what a bargain” with a “laughing tears” emoji, implying that Apple spends too much money on research and development but the results are not commensurate.

Meanwhile, user Chris Bakke cited data saying Apple invested $29.9 billion in R&D last year. Musk sarcastically said: “That sounds a bit high.”

Elon Musk responded to a meme post about the iPhone 16 over the X.

User DogeDesigner posted a meme of Spider-Man, “representing” generations from iPhone XS to iPhone 16, implying that it’s hard to tell which is real because they’re so similar. Musk commented: “It’s hard to tell unless you look closely.”

According to India Times , the American billionaire is mocking the iPhone 16 as not being too special, not even different from previous iPhone generations, implying that Apple ‘s R&D team has had an idle year despite spending tens of billions of dollars on product innovation research every year.

Experts also rated Apple’s iPhone 16 launch as unimpressive . Some said the event was boring, the product did not have many breakthroughs, and the expected feature Apple Intelligence was not enough to excite users.