I decided not to go with the 16 (I have a 15 Pro Max, and prior to that had 11 Pro Max) simply as to me, it did not have anything overly amazing on it. Oh yeah, more camera and associated upgrades. Well I don't take that many photos and the 15 seems pretty good to me. Do I need a faster phone, not really. I usually just message, browse some social media, maybe play the odd game now and then. To be honest Wordle is one of the daily things I do on the phone, so it's seriously overpowered for that.
I doubt the 17 will have anything radically different to be honest. It'll probably be even more AI powered stuff, which we likely won't need.
It's a bit similar to the Apple Watch to me, it's a great idea, but not for me. I have regular watches (not actually worn a watch since I was WFH full-time) to tell the time, and the health stuff isn't overly my kind of thing. If it had the ability to grab my blood sugar levels, then that would give me pause to possibly get one, but I am unsure if that is even possible without, you know, getting blood out of someone.