iPhone upgrade cycles stretch to 4 years: Apple's incentives slow old phones without sabotage

aakashgupta · x · 2026-09-19

A long post argues Apple never needs to deliberately slow old iPhones — organizational incentives already point that way.

iPhones generate $200 billion a year, over half of Apple's revenue; the biggest threat is users deciding their current phone is fine. US upgrade cycles have stretched from under 3 years a decade ago to nearly 4, and every extra month across a billion users wipes out billions in sales.
Thousands of engineers advance by shipping features that shine on the newest chip; making iOS snappy on a 2020 phone advances nobody's career. Old phones show up internally as a QA line item.
So software grows one direction only: each iOS release piles on background services and on-device AI models that load whether you use them or not.

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