Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Apple Commits to at Least Five Years of iPhone Security Updates

allenvanhellen said:
Good, and security updates should continue.
Click to expand...
They are... iOS 16.7.8 came out on May 13.

This is good that Apple now has a formal thing saying they'll support devices for 5+ years. Makes it easier to tell people that their older devices will indeed be ok to continue using a bit longer.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RumorChaser
Imory said:
That’s a step in the right direction, but certainly disappointing given the additional two years provided by their competitors. I see no reason why Apple doesn’t provide the same length of support as their Macs which is essentially 7 years.

You can certainly do better here Apple.
Click to expand...
To be fair, their competitors have yet to meet their claims even once. :)
 
MilaM said:
When you look at iPhones and iPads, I agree. But due to the Intel/Apple Silicon transition, some more recent Macs were not so lucky. I have an iMac that will only get six years of security patches after last being sold in the market. And I'm still quite miffed because of this.
Click to expand...

You hit the nail on the end. While Apple's soft policy is to provide security patches or 7 years or more, they are reserving the right to limit it to 5 years if they find themselves going through another major technology migration in the unforeseeable future. That appears to be based on going through two previous such transitions with Macs. Let us keep in mind that these policies, once made "official", are essentially "forever". It's been 40 years and change since Apple's founding, including at least one mid-life point where bankruptcy was a real concern, and every dollar counted. That's in the corporate memory. The companies will surely go through existential challenges over the next 40 years.
 
Apple has commitment issues for real. They’ll probably provide much more than 5 years, but are unwilling to commit to doing so, just so they aren’t legally liable. But as a consumer, people should only listen to what companies are guaranteeing them. For that reason, more people should speak up about comparing this to Android. It’s bad.
 
Motorola68000 said:
The problem with this 'commitment' is it does not mean that iPhones will have full facilities, i.e. AI for example, where it suggests that even phones way under 5 years will find they can not utilise functions otherwise available.

Effectively it might support software upgrades, but not necessarily full upgrades across the 5 year range, so by recent comments about AI, it would make that 5 year support somewhat erroneous.
Click to expand...
Off course, any product may not have "full facilities" after the warranty period. That's what a warranty is. Stuff breaks.

If you are instead talking about "not getting NEW functionality that other phones have enabled in the latest updates", no manufacturer is obliged to get you more functionality than was there at the time of purchase. That's their option, which many choose to do, for various market strategy reasons. They get to weigh the trade-offs of giving you functionality you didn't pay for against other business concerns.

If you mean, losing some existing facility due to extraneous forces, that's precisely what security updates do.
 
Wild how iPhones were known for support longevity but now Google and Samsung commit to more years with cheaper phones
(7 years commitment vs Apple’s “at least 5”)
 
macduke said:
Apple has commitment issues for real. They’ll probably provide much more than 5 years, but are unwilling to commit to doing so, just so they aren’t legally liable. But as a consumer, people should only listen to what companies are guaranteeing them. For that reason, more people should speak up about comparing this to Android. It’s bad.
Click to expand...
I somewhat agree but that is defending Apple a bit too much here. Why can Google commit to 7 years of updates? (With “weaker” hardware on top of that?)

Look at their own iOS devices. On one hand iPhone 6 (iOS 8 -> iOS 12) was one year shorter than iphone 5s (iOS 7 -> iOS 12) despite coming out the prior year.

same with iPhone 6s (iOS 9 -> iOS 15) vs iPhone 7 (iOS 10 -> iOS 15) and iPhone 8/X (iOS 11 -> iOS 16)

Meanwhile XS/XR (iOS 12 -> 17 so far) look poised to get the latest iOS 18 per rumours so that an increase to 6 years

Regardless that commitment being “a legal ideal” is probably correct but criticism about this relative to competition and the ability to support 5 updates one year or 6 updates another is warranted

iPhone built its reputation on software support and longevity back in the day and now androids are committing to longer support. That is ironic
 
nordique said:
Wild how iPhones were known for support longevity but now Google and Samsung commit to more years with cheaper phones
(7 years commitment vs Apple’s “at least 5”)
Click to expand...
Apple wouldn't commit anything more than necessary. But from past experience they do provide full security updates the phone for about 7-8 years. 7 for iPhone 6 and 7. 8 for iPhone 5s/6s.

So it is a case they commit to a low number and exceed that commitment in practice.

Commitment is still a positive though. Before this, Apple can technically just stop supporting a new phone sooner than they have historically done. But now you're assured new phones will get at least 5.
 
foobarbaz said:
No, they should do better.
A minimum of five years of major OS versions (as they have already been doing in the past) is okay IMO, but security updates should be guaranteed for longer. Google and Samsung show it's possible.

Remember, Apple sells iPhones for 3 years. So 5 years after initial release is only 2 years for some customers. That's just not enough. (Again, not talking about new features but security updates, without which using the phone is frankly gambling.)
Click to expand...
New features are mostly new Emojis so they are not so important. Security updates are the most important updates. Just kidding. :)
 
I don't think there's much to discuss here - Apple are definitely under promising and overdelivering having been 'forced' to publish this note. We know they habitually support for longer than that on most products they sell.

After all, in general we might expect 5 years of main line major OS updates plus an additional 2 of security updates for the last approved update on that device when Apple stop providing updates for specific older devices. As mentioned elsewhere they also drop in the occasional security release for really ancient devices.
 
For example, just this March Apple pushed a security update to iPhone 6s models, which launched in September 2015, or nine years ago.
Click to expand...

The way this sentence was worded is technically correct, but misleading in context.

The update Apple provided in March for the iPhone 6s and 7 is not a full security update. It is a security update to the Safari sub-component built into the iOS system. That is akin to a Google Chrome update on Android, or Internet Explorer update on Windows. This is due to how Apple chose to completely integrated Safari into iOS, and chose to deliver Safari updates over system OTA rather than App Store. (If anyone has doubts, take a look at the CVE for the updates and it is apparent only Safari is affected)

This update cannot be used as evidence for Apple providing full security updates for iOS. (Apples to apples comparison would be installing a new Google Chrome version on phones long abandoned by the OEM)

iPhone 6s and 7 full security updates ended in September 2023. That is 8 years since 6s's launch.
 
  • Like
Reactions: TLuc
I feel like it should be 5 years from the last moment they officially sell it. sometimes they get sold for quite a long time.... might be 3 years old and sold "new", but then it is only 2 years left, which is terrible.
 
MilaM said:
When you look at iPhones and iPads, I agree. But due to the Intel/Apple Silicon transition, some more recent Macs were not so lucky. I have an iMac that will only get six years of security patches after last being sold in the market. And I'm still quite miffed because of this.
Click to expand...
This policy will allow them to reduce that 6 years down to 5. It was good of the UK to enforce a policy on Apple that requires them to provide less support then they already do.
 
Imory said:
That’s a step in the right direction, but certainly disappointing given the additional two years provided by their competitors. I see no reason why Apple doesn’t provide the same length of support as their Macs which is essentially 7 years.

You can certainly do better here Apple.
Click to expand...

Apple doesn’t need to do better because apple has always supported their devices. Android is notorious for not updating their devices after nearly 20 years on the market so thankfully they finally guarantee they’ll stop dropping devices after one or two years.

Apple literally gave the iPhone 6s a total of 7 major updates from iOS 9 to 15.

No android phone has ever had that and we will see if google stands by their word.
 
  • Like
Reactions: smirking
Nozuka said:
I feel like it should be 5 years from the last moment they officially sell it. sometimes they get sold for quite a long time.... might be 3 years old and sold "new", but then it is only 2 years left, which is terrible.
Click to expand...
That literally makes no sense. There are still iPhone 11 still sold by retailers brand new.
 
what’s really annoying for me is that Apple will pump fake that you can stay on the last Major Version and only get security updates, then after 2 security updates only put them out for devices that don’t support the next version.

I know apologists will say this is fine, but it’s clearly a method to force you to update to get their “adoption” numbers up.

For example :

iPad Minui 5 on iOS 16 received 16.7.1 and 16.7.2, but then could only update to 17, while devices that don’t support 17 continue to get 16.7.3 etc
 
Feels like it's been 6-7 easily, and security even beyond that since day 1 for iOS devices, and Mac as well since I became an Apple user in 2008.
 
tkaravou said:
The law says it’s 5 year minimum so they said okay cause they’re doing it anyway. This is a non-story
Click to expand...
Exactly. The iPhone 6s for example is slated to receive 9 years of security updates.

Apple is just saying that they meet the minimum but in practice they far exceed it.
 
All these comparisons between what Google and Samsung provide versus what Apple has committed to here begs the question:

How will smartphones like Pixel 8A perform on the latest Android version in 2031?

I'm all for sustainability and longevity.

But I doubt anyone is going to love running Android 21 or 22 on these 2024 Google and Samsung smartphones.
 
RumorChaser said:
The way this sentence was worded is technically correct, but misleading in context.

The update Apple provided in March for the iPhone 6s and 7 is not a full security update. It is a security update to the Safari sub-component built into the iOS system. That is akin to a Google Chrome update on Android, or Internet Explorer update on Windows. This is due to how Apple chose to completely integrated Safari into iOS, and chose to deliver Safari updates over system OTA rather than App Store. (If anyone has doubts, take a look at the CVE for the updates and it is apparent only Safari is affected)

This update cannot be used as evidence for Apple providing full security updates for iOS. (Apples to apples comparison would be installing a new Google Chrome version on phones long abandoned by the OEM)

iPhone 6s and 7 full security updates ended in September 2023. That is 8 years since 6s's launch.
Click to expand...
Moreover, lots and lots of the OS on Android devices are functionally "apps" on the app store (eg: "Private Compute Services" or "Google Wi-Fi Provisioner"), so even old devices receive updates to the operating system continuously - long after "Android updates" end. And this is an active process on the part of Google to devolve more and more of the core OS to "apps."

I like Apple's commitment to supporting devices, which I believe to be genuine, but "iOS updates" have such an outsized importance specifically because of how they choose to go about things.
 
vertsix said:
This is actually *less* of a commitment than Google for the Pixel, which is very surprising. 7 years should be a minimum. The iPhone 5s got 7 years of software support, and roughly two more in occassional security updates.

But support has been decreasing over years. iPhone 6 got a year less of support, and so did the iPhone 7 and iPhone 8.

Apple's hoping we don't notice.
Click to expand...
The iPhone 5 was supported from iOS 6 to iOS 10 - 4 years
The iPhone 6 was supported from iOS 8 to iOS 12 - 4 years
The iPhone 7 was supported from iOS 10 to iOS 15 - 5 years
The iPhone 8 was supported from iOS 11 to iOS 16 - 5 years

Apple’s hoping we don’t notice that later phones are getting more support?
 
MilaM said:
Strange move by Apple to only guarantee the five-year minimum. Would be interesting to know what the rationale is behind this.

Long term software support is probably the most important reason why I buy and recommend Apple devices.
Click to expand...
Erm

$$$

Have you SEEN the outrageous RAM prices?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back