Apple's 'Glowtime' event kicks off on Monday, and there's a lot riding on the iPhone 16

• Apple will unveil new devices at the 'Glowtime' event, including the eagerly awaited iPhone 16.
• The tech giant's AI push started with its Apple Intelligence reveal at the June conference.
• New AI-supporting iPhones, AirPods, and Apple Watch models may drive a major upgrade cycle.

Apple is gearing up to announce a new lineup of devices at its "Glowtime" event on Monday.

All eyes have been on the tech giant since it unveiled Apple Intelligence at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June. The artificial intelligence arms race is fully underway in the industry, and a lot is now riding on whether Apple's upcoming hardware will prove its investment in AI will pay off.

If it does, Apple "will be the gatekeeper of the consumer AI Revolution," Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives wrote in a Friday note. The event kicks off Monday at 1 p.m. ET at Apple Park in California and will be live-streamed on Apple's website.

Apple is said to be training store employees on the AI features in preparation for the launch. And last week, the marketing exec Greg Joswiak teased the "Glowtime" event on X.

Analysts have hailed the coming launch as the key to sparking an iPhone upgrade boom; after all, Apple Intelligence will be fully available only on iPhone 15s and newer models — like the iPhone 16, which many expect to be unveiled on Monday.

"There is a lot riding on these new iPhones," tech analyst Gadjo Sevilla at Emarketer, a sister company to Business Insider, said. "They're Apple's most profitable product category and also the vital cog to the company's expanding universe of services and subscriptions, which is now their second most profitable business."

The tech giant is also expected to launch new models of AirPods and the Apple Watch. The watches are set to have larger screens but be slimmed down. Midlevel AirPods could get noise cancellation, and the lower-end AirPods could also get updates.

"We believe the excitement over Apple Intelligence can potentially accelerate hardware replacement and enable market share gain for iPhone, iPad, and Mac," Oppenheimer strategists said in a note.

With about 1.5 billion iPhones, according to Wedbush analysts, Apple is setting itself up to usher in a "golden upgrade cycle" amid slipping iPhone sales in the last quarter.

But it'll have to stick the landing at Monday's event and continue to deliver in the coming months.