Whatever new features Apple announces next week, these three are the ones that really matter

  

On Sept. 12, Apple execs will pull out the stops, hoping to convince consumers that the new iPhones are faster, sleeker and so powerful you'll have to ditch your old one to get the newest model.

But if you ask consumers, which we did, there are only three new features that they really, really care about.

In our exclusive USA TODAY/SurveyMonkey Audience survey of 1,665 adults, it all comes down to the battery, glass and storage.

Seventy-five percent of the survey respondents said they wanted longer battery life, compared with 66 percent who longed for shatter-proof glass screen. In third place, at 44 percent, shoppers hoped for something that Apple has never given, which rivals like Samsung do: expandable storage.

Others on the wish list:

—Charge the phone to be able to listen on headphones simultaneously (39 percent) while 37 percent said to back the headphone jack.

—Ditch the Lightning port (29 percent) and replace it with a USB-C connector, which has become the new all-in-one port for charging phones, computers and some cameras.

—Improvement to the FaceID recognition system, which some critics say is spotty. (19 percent)

—A faster refresh rate for apps. (18 percent)

—Remove the notch from the top of the iPhone X screen: (10 percent)

When asked to choose just one new feature, battery won out at 38 percent, compared with 24 percent for the shatter-proof screen.

This SurveyMonkey Audience survey was conducted online from Aug. 17-21, 2018, with 1,665 adults ages 18 or older living in the United States. Respondents for these surveys were selected from more than 2 million people who take surveys on the SurveyMonkey platform each day. The modeled error estimate for the full sample is plus or minus 3 percentage points. Data have been weighted for age, race, sex, education and geography using the Census Bureau's American Community Survey to reflect the demographic composition of the United States age 18 and over.

Explore further: Review: Apple's removal of headphone jack a net loss for consumers