Your phone can probably take a tumble out of your hand to the floor without breaking, but can it survive a fall from the stratosphere? Case maker RhinoSheild wrapped an iPhone in its AirX case, dropped it just miles from outer space, and it remained intact enough to earn the company a Guinness World Record.
On June 24, RhinoSheild floated an iPhone 17 Pro into near-space from the Esrange Space Center in Sweden. Wrapped in nothing but an AirX case, the phone reached an altitude of 100,416 feet, or the equivalent of 18.6 miles, with some help from a weather balloon. This put the phone directly in the middle of the Earth’s stratosphere, which tops out at 31 miles, halfway to the Kármán Line at 62 miles.
What they found was astonishing.
So technically, the phone wasn’t in space per se, but it was suspended higher than any other phone to date before it was released, left to spiral through sub-zero temperatures ranging from –40°F to –76°F before it crashed to the ground. After impact, a scouting crew scoured a region the size of 784,000 football fields in a helicopter guided by satellite trackers to locate the phone. What they found was astonishing.
The iPhone 17 Pro and the RhinoSheild AirX case were both fully intact with no scratches on the screen or obvious broken components. Appearances can be deceiving though. To be sure the phone was truly unharmed, a Guinness World Record examiner conducted a functionality test to ensure it still powered on and off, made phone calls, and took photos. It passed every checkpoint with flying colors, ultimately earning RhinoSheild a Guinness World Record for the stunt.
In this case, bragging rights go to both Apple and RhinoSheild. The iPhone 17 Pro is already notably durable, with a scratch-resistant Ceramic Shield 2 display and a solid aluminum body that beat the dreaded bend test in JerryRigEverything’s annual torture gauntlet.
As for RhinoSheild, it claims that the AirX case in its drop test features an outer “air isolation chamber” that absorbs fall impact by up to 81%. In most cases, this would sound more like marketing spin than a real-life challenge, but the Guinness World Record speaks for itself. The case really does offer significant drop protection that’s literally out of this world.
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This isn’t the farthest an iPhone has traveled from Earth. During NASA’s mission around the moon in April, the astronauts aboard Artemis II were allowed to bring phones aboard the capsule for the first time. Armed with several iPhone 17 Pro Max devices, the crew captured stunning photos of Earth that you can see on NASA’s X page.
Between a jaunt to the moon and now RhinoSheild’s extreme drop test, iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max are the highest-flying phones to ever exist by 252,756 miles, a stat that is unlikely to change until Elon Musk finally takes humanity to Mars.
That doesn’t mean other phones still can’t get in on the action while our feet are planted on God’s green Earth. In addition to iPhone, the AirX from the drop test is available for Samsung Galaxy S26 and S26 Ultra in Vero Black and Flux Gray. You can also choose from custom designs or make your own in the Design Studio. Lastly, AirX includes MagSafe support for easy wireless charging on both iPhone and Galaxy.
AirX is only one of the cases in RhinoSheild’s lineup. Several slimmer options are also available, but if you want maximum “space-grade” protection that can withstand even the highest fall to Earth, AirX is the only one with a Guinness World Record to its name.
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Iphone, Tech, Case, Space
