All Devices iOS 13 Minimum System Requirements Speculation

[Yebubbleman]

With two months to go until WWDC 2019, I thought it might be fun to play this game:

Which devices currently capable of running iOS 12, do you think WON'T make the cut to be able to run iOS 13 when it releases later this year?

Personally, knowing what I know of the Apple A-series of iDevice processors, I'm thinking that the A8 isn't THAT different from the A7 and that if one is to be allowed for another year (or disallowed starting this year) that the other will likely follow suit. While perfectly usable and way better than it was on iOS 11, the A7 and A8 do still show their age in iOS 12. So, I'm thinking that unless Apple makes further effort to optimize as they did with iOS 12, we might see the cutting of both the A7 and A8. But that's just my prediction. (I'm on the fence about the iPad Air 2's A8X; not just for its third core, but I seem to recall it being substantially more powerful than the A8 at the time.) Certainly, I wouldn't be surprised if I was wrong and they kept the A8 or even the A7.

(I'm not even going to list A10 and A10X and newer devices as possible options as I feel like those are all pretty much guaranteed to be able to run iOS 13 and that few if any will disagree there.)

 

[C DM]

Of course anything could happen, but it would be at least somewhat odd (and thus at least somewhat unlikely) that if Apple would drop support for let's say iPhone 5s they would at the same time also drop support for iPhone 6/6+ which was released a year later.

 

[user_xyz]

Good question and I have No Idea!!

 

[cynics]

Even though Apple is a hardware company first they have a lot of incentive to keep as many devices as possible on the latest OS. To do this they have a lot of systems in place to remove the need for devs to code for specific GPU's, I believe Metal Performance Shaders is a particular framework for games. Graphics can be dumb down from a new devices to old devices with minimal developer intervention.

Eventually it won't be able to sustain quality from the newest iPhone to the oldest any longer. At that point it will be no different than a PC not meeting minimum system requirements except the OS not being to be updated. Devs will now be given the choice whether to support that model or not. Some devs might find that beneficial for business reasons (like a banks app to run credit and process loans) others will not because it was holding them back (games).

Apple will see the writing on the wall long before that day though and potentially just push a device out the door to minimize fragmentation of doing 3 different models at once.

My answer would be the A7 might not see iOS 13 and the reason could be purely arbitrary.

 

[ScreenSavers]

What are your guesses for iOS 13? It’s a shame to see the 64-bit 5S go, because it runs smoothly on iOS 12, but I’d be surprised if Apple gave it another upgrade.


My guess?

Probably iPhone 6 and later, iPad Air 2 and later, iPad mini 4 and later, all iPad pros, and iPod touch 6th generation.

I wish they’d keep the same requirements but the 1 GB of RAM in the A7 devices might not make the cut.

 

[Tmacc47]

Yeah I believe the 5s and 6 will get the axe. The 5s is approaching 6 years old and the 6 is not much more than a 5s in a bigger shell. I'd be really surprised if any of the newer 2 gig ram devices got cut..

 

[ScreenSavers]

Yeah I believe the 5s and 6 will get the axe. The 5s is approaching 6 years old and the 6 is not much more than a 5s in a bigger shell. I'd be really surprised if any of the newer 2 gig ram devices got cut..

I don’t see the 6 getting cut yet. The iPad mini 4 (A8 processor) was JUST discontinued. They don’t drop two major iPhone versions at one time.

 

[EugW]

At one point I thought all 1 GB devices would be killed off, but then I decided to go through all the devices one by one to check out their specs, and it turns out the HomePod has A8 and 1 GB of RAM but was only released in 2018 so obviously they’re not going to kill that one off.

See my table here:

My guess is no A7 devices will be supported in iOS 13. However, I also think all A8 devices could get supported, although there is a possibility that they would kill off the iPhone 6/6 Plus and iPod touch too while keeping the iPad mini 4 and iPad Air 2. It’s also possible that Apple would make hardware HEVC/HEIF support a hard requirement (outside of HomePod), meaning they would kill off all A8/A8X devices, but that seems rather drastic.

Underlying OS design notwithstanding, personally I think a reasonable cutoff (outside of HomePod) for iOS 13 would be 2 GB RAM. From a performance and stability standpoint, that would make sense. I do note that some more complex apps are crashy on 1 GB iDevices, but are stable on 2 GB iDevices.

Looking forward to 2020 with iOS 14, I could see them making A9/A9X the minimum because of their hardware HEVC/HEIF decode support and for performance reasons, although the iPad Air 2 with A8X does keep up with A9 pretty well outside of HEVC.

 

[magicMac]

It’s quite possible they won’t cut any this year. All previous years have had a reason for it. A4 was due to <1GB RAM, A6 and below was due to lack of 64bit support. If they do remove support this year with iOS 13 it will be A7 due to the lack of metal support and they remove the non-metal gfx libraries to simplify and shrink the OS. The argument is starting to become a bit weak though. I suspect the A7 will remain supported for as long as 1GB+ RAM devices are supported.

 

[EugW]

It’s quite possible they won’t cut any this year. All previous years have had a reason for it. A4 was due to <1GB RAM, A6 and below was due to lack of 64bit support. If they do remove support this year with iOS 13 it will be A7 due to the lack of metal support and they remove the non-metal gfx libraries to simplify and shrink the OS. The argument is starting to become a bit weak though. I suspect the A7 will remain supported for as long as 1GB+ RAM devices are supported.

As I’ve listed in my table above, A7 supports Metal. It just is very slow at it.

I think they should just kill off all 1 GB devices (except HomePod) as 1 GB is already quite problematic, since as mentioned it is a cause of instability.

However, this option wasn’t listed in the above poll, and I’m not sure they will make this the cutoff. They could just make A8 the minimum requirement for iOS 13 regardless of RAM and call it a day, so that’s what I voted. Then again, some rumours out there do claim 1 GB iPhones and iPods are also on the chopping block.

 

[bodonnell202]

I'm going to guess that the A7 devices will be cut, but all A8/A8x devices will still be supported in iOS 13.

Yes, I get that there isn't a big different in CPU performance between the A7 & A8, but the A8 did have a pretty big jump in GPU/Metal performance. That, and Apple is still selling some devices with the A8 (iPod Touch, HomePod & Apple TV 4), plus the iPad Mini 4 was just discontinued. No A7 devices have been sold in years and they are reaching vintage status.

 

[magicMac]

As I’ve listed in my table above, A7 supports Metal. It just is very slow at it.

I think they should just kill off all 1 GB devices (except HomePod) as 1 GB is already quite problematic, since as mentioned it is a cause of instability.

However, this option wasn’t listed in the above poll, and I’m not sure they will make this the cutoff. They could just make A8 the minimum requirement for iOS 13 regardless of RAM and call it a day, so that’s what I voted. Then again, some rumours out there do claim 1 GB iPhones and iPods are also on the chopping block.

ah , didn't see your table before, good table, didn't know metal ran on A7, because I think it was introduced around the time of the iPhone6/A8/iOS 8. Agree'd about 1GB. I can imagine hardware HEVC decode being the cut off in future but possibly not until iOS 14 the following year, it would be too controversial for apple to not release iOS 13 for A9 devices as they are already seen as the "new big bullish company" who make their hardware obsolete on purpose (whether true or not is another matter).

by the way, you've listed iPad pro 12.9" 3rd gen twice on the table with different amounts of RAM

 

[EugW]

by the way, you've listed iPad pro 12.9" 3rd gen twice on the table with different amounts of RAM

There are two different memory capacities for the 12.9" 3rd gen, one with 4 GB RAM (64 GB and 256 GB storage), and one with 6 GB RAM (1 TB storage).

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/10/30/ipad-pro-1tb-has-6gb-ram/

 

[GuruZac]

Everything with 1GB or less will not get the update. I think Apple will probably keep 6S and iPad Pro Gen 1 and up.

 

[TheSkywalker77]

Of course anything could happen, but it would be at least somewhat odd (and thus at least somewhat unlikely) that if Apple would drop support for let's say iPhone 5s they would at the same time also drop support for iPhone 6/6+ which was released a year later.

The plan was to drop support for the 5s last year though, but with the disaster iOS 11 turned out to be they kept support for it so it doesn’t lose support on a bad version. So if they didn’t do that the 6/6+ would be losing support a year after the 5s. I’m thinking the A7, A8, and A8X chips will be losing support. And the A9 and A9X chips will get iOS 13 but not iOS 14. A10+ will get iOS 14, and who knows what’ll happen after that.

 

[souko]

It was that S iPhones got 1 year of support more compared to noS versions... I think that A7 will drop and A8 stay

 

[ScreenSavers]

I guess my thread got taken from me and merged with another one. Nice. Well you saw my guess up above.

 

[JPack]

A7 will drop. A8 and newer will stay.

Apple's whole concept of selling new iOS devices revolves around the SoC, not RAM. Older devices with less RAM can have fewer features in iOS, but I doubt Apple drops devices based on memory.

 

[EugW]

A7 will drop. A8 and newer will stay.

Apple's whole concept of selling new iOS devices revolves around the SoC, not RAM. Older devices with less RAM can have fewer features in iOS, but I doubt Apple drops devices based on memory.

Yes, usually Apple sets the minimum requirements based on SoC generation, but occasionally has used RAM as the cutoff as well.

It will be interesting to see what Apple will do with A12X and A10X, and even A8X, because those chips have radically different performance than the corresponding A12, A10, and A8 SoCs. Some also came with different amounts of RAM too.

A8X is 50% faster than A8, and is about as fast as A9, if not a bit faster. A8X also comes 2 GB RAM, while most A8 devices are 1 GB RAM. A9 devices all came with 2 GB RAM too.

A10X is 60% faster than A10, and is almost as fast as A11 and is not far off even A12. A10X also comes with 4 GB RAM, while A10 devices are 2-3 GB.

A12X is 60% faster than A12. We can't compare it against A13 yet. A12X also comes with 4-6 GB RAM, while A12 devices are 3-4 GB.

 

[JPack]

Yes, usually Apple sets the minimum requirements based on SoC generation, but occasionally has used RAM as the cutoff as well.

It will be interesting to see what Apple will do with A12X and A10X, and even A8X, because those chips have radically different performance than the corresponding A12, A10, and A8 SoCs. Some also came with different amounts of RAM too.

A8X is 50% faster than A8, and is about as fast as A9, if not a bit faster. A8X also comes 2 GB RAM, while most A8 devices are 1 GB RAM. A9 devices all came with 2 GB RAM too.

A10X is 60% faster than A10, and is almost as fast as A11 and is not far off even A12. A10X also comes with 4 GB RAM, while A10 devices are 2-3 GB.

A12X is 60% faster than A12. We can't compare it against A13 yet. A12X also comes with 4-6 GB RAM, while A12 devices are 3-4 GB.

Given iOS 13 is expected to focus on new iPad features, the additional memory and CPU performance will come in handy particularly for multitasking.

I don't think Apple will support A8X longer than A8, or similarly A10X longer than A10. Those devices have more performance based on their intended use as a tablet.

 

[EugW]

Given iOS 13 is expected to focus on new iPad features, the additional memory and CPU performance will come in handy particularly for multitasking.

Well, that's just it. A8X has 50% more CPU performance, and twice the RAM as compared to most (but not all) A8 devices.

Furthermore, A9 didn't actually get much faster, if at all.

This is in stark contrast to A5X vs A6 for example. A6 is way faster than A5X.

I don't think Apple will support A8X longer than A8, or similarly A10X longer than A10. Those devices have more performance based on their intended use as a tablet.

The other factor to consider is release date. While A8 and A8X came out the same year, A10X came out the year after A10. In fact, A11 came out just three months after A10X. A10X also has strong Metal performance (which is comparable to or sometimes even higher than A12), and has both hardware HEVC decode and encode already.

I get where you're coming from, and what you say might be true, but I don't think we can rule out the possibility that A10X will be supported 1 year longer than A10.

 

[now i see it]

It won't really matter if the 5S and 6 are officially supported. They'll run like slugs and you'll wish you never installed it.
Look what happened to the iPhone 4S. Perfectly good phone, ruined by iOS 9 which is officially supported.

It's in Apple's best interest to support the older phones because the new OS will make them unbearable to use- so people will be "forced" to buy a new iPhone.

 

[EugW]

It won't really matter if the 5S and 6 are officially supported. They'll run like slugs and you'll wish you never installed it.
Look what happened to the iPhone 4S. Perfectly good phone, ruined by iOS 9 which is officially supported.

It's in Apple's best interest to support the older phones because the new OS will make them unbearable to use- so people will be "forced" to buy a new iPhone.

I guess the good news though is that Apple signs the previous OS version for at least a few days after the new release so you can downgrade if the new version is too slow.

 

[Yebubbleman]

The only reason why I'm believing that A7 and A8 will lose support at the same time is that there isn't that much of a difference between them. Perhaps with the SoC's GPU. If that became the dividing line, that COULD make sense. That said, the jump from A8 to A9 was far more significant and was almost as significant as the jump from A6 to A7. The graphics and the jump from eMMC storage (used in A8 and earlier) to PCIe/NVMe storage alone are monumental gains that I can't imagine Apple wouldn't want as standard for iOS at some point in time.

That said, it is unusual for Apple to discontinue an iOS device and support for it in the next version of iOS that same year; though, it's not unheard of. They did do it with the fourth generation iPod touch the same year iOS 7 dropped support for it. It wouldn't totally shock me if they did it for the A8, despite the still-sold status of the 6th Generation iPod touch and the only recent discontinuation of the iPad mini 4. As for HomePod and the Fourth Generation Apple TV: though those are still-sold products as well and though the operating system on HomePod and tvOS are both similar to iOS, the operation of those operating systems are different enough that I wouldn't think it would matter as much for those systems.

 

[EugW]

The only reason why I'm believing that A7 and A8 will lose support at the same time is that there isn't that much of a difference between them. Perhaps with the SoC's GPU. If that became the dividing line, that COULD make sense. That said, the jump from A8 to A9 was far more significant and was almost as significant as the jump from A6 to A7.

The X chips starting with A8X change things somewhat, since A8X is as fast as A9 for CPU, and not that far off for GPU.

As as you touched on, A8's GPU is far, far, far faster than A7's GPU, and A8X's GPU is far faster than A8's GPU.