iOS 17 Adoption is Slower Than iOS 16 Adoption

[bankshot]

Purely anecdotal here, but I live in SF and have had about a 30% success rate with NameDrop—most new people I meet, even techies, haven't updated to iOS 17

I’ve never intentionally tried to use NameDrop, but it frequently gets in the way of sharing by touching phones, which is a very frustrating experience. But I’ll say that in my limited experience, every single person I’ve tried the new sharing thing with has been on iOS 17 so it worked. Pretty much all non-technical users, and near universal gasps of amazement and delight when the little animation and haptics came up. It’s a great little touch, just wish it were more discoverable to those who don’t follow sites like MacRumors. Of course that applies to so many little things in the OS these days that are not obvious!

 

[spartan1967]

There is only one thing I will admit is better with iOS 17 (specifically 17.3). My wife's 14 Pro wirelessly connects to CarPlay all the time now where is was literally 50% of the time with the latest iOS 16. The question I have will it continue to be 100% with iOS 17 when iOS 18 is released.

Also, a serious issue in iOS 17 with her 14 Pro. It does not have the ability to select Location "While Using the App" in Siri & Dictation, only the choice "Never" is available.

So no directions, weather, etc. from Siri while driving, which makes no sense since I have both choices on my 13 Mini under the same 17.3 version.

 

[ThomasJL]

Bugs, bugs, bugs. Maybe Apple will get the hint?

If Apple can get rid of just one specific bug, then that would prevent many future bugs. That one specific bug is Tim Cook.

 

[turbineseaplane]

That one specific bug is Tim Cook.

Doesn't he want to retire and do the faux philanthropy (actually an ego boosting tax deduction) circuit or something?

Go enjoy your wealth Tim!

 

[usersince86]

"Accidentally" updated to iOS17

Honestly, nothing to see here... move along

 

[supergt]

I have many devices and none are on 17.

Why? Because they already are or will be jailbroken!

 

[windywalks]

I must be using my phone an iPad wrong.
There are no major bugs that would rear their heads in my day to day iOS 17 usage.

 

[femike]

Well, I'm still happily using the iPhone 6S (would like an independent browser as the EU will have). But, not surprised as iOS improvements have been minimal. And there are issues which Apple should address in iOS but they haven't.

 

[TruthAboveAllElse]

No, mostly likely because there are 250 million more devices than there were the last time this was measured.

Every year Macrumors writes stories like this, with absolutely no sense of context. As the installed base of devices grows the percentage of devices that upgrade quickly (or at all) will decrease. It's simple math. Macrumors tries to paint it as there being a "reason" for it, like a conscious reason. There isn't. It's just what happens when the installed base grows, and this particular one grows by almost unimaginable numbers every year.

That is not simple math, a percentage isn't affected by the sample size alone, there must be other variables.

Apple doesn't care if you update your phone or not.

Yes they do.

 

[PsykX]

If Apple can get rid of just one specific bug, then that would prevent many future bugs. That one specific bug is Tim Cook.

I do not think Cook is the programmers' manager, the one doing unit tests and control quality, not the programmer himself.

The one thing he can do is enforce control quality, and fire those who don't enforce it enough.

 

[tomscott1988]

Probably because so many good phones that should get IOS17 have been put on the non supported list and people still love phones like the iPhone X. I know loads of people that own them and just don't see the point in upgrading.

I used one earlier on in the year and the battery was less than to be desired but the rest of the phone worked just like my 15 pro albeit the 120hz but If you haven't experienced it then you don't know what your missing!

 

[whiteashsaturday]

Well, I'm still happily using the iPhone 6S (would like an independent browser as the EU will have). But, not surprised as iOS improvements have been minimal. And there are issues which Apple should address in iOS but they haven't.

I was waiting for someone to mention a slightly older phone. I know two people on an iPhone 7Plus and iPhone 7 that are on iOS16 still. Up until a year or so ago T-Mobile and others were still offering the cheapest "free iPhone" plans with iPhone 7/Plus's.

I'm sporting the iPhone 6 body style in my iPhone SE2020 (Apple A13 Bionic). The benchmarks are over 2.5x faster than the iPhone 7. The chip is 1/2 the size at 7nm.

A13 Bionic vs A10 Fusion: tests and benchmarks

We put Apple A13 Bionic against A10 Fusion to find out which SoC is better. See performance comparison in benchmarks and games.

nanoreview.net

I'm waiting for "the next new iPhone".
Long live the TouchID.

(by the way, my iPad Air 4th gen Apple A14 Bionic with power button TouchID works flawless).

 

[Shanghaichica]

66 % of active phones is pretty good. Considering that not all eligible phones have upgraded to iOS 17 yet.

Compared to android that’s very good.

 

[AndiG]

This is not such a huge difference in numbers, but people are bored to death, including me. Every year the same story repeats: Tim enters the stage says the same things like the year before, shows the same pictures like the year before (can anyone tell the difference?).
Next the OS is released with even more bugs and more (mostly) annoying features.

Honestly, was „mother nature“ presented the last year or the year before? I can‘t tell the difference anymore.


By the way, it is even worse on the Mac- I‘m terrified of updating my Mac cause I need it to get my work done.

 

[turbineseaplane]

By the way, it is even worse on the Mac- I‘m terrified of updating my Mac cause I need it to get my work done.

I’m on Ventura with no plans to move for a while.

Tired of it all

 

[coolfactor]

It's getting *really* hard to distinguish one version from the next these days. We're 17 versions in.... the evolutionary model is just one big blend. Does it blend? Yes, it does! Every year!

 

[coolfactor]

Going to stay with iOS 16.7.2 for a little bit longer even if Apple won't provide us iOS 16 users with any more updates if our devices can be updated to iOS 17. Stop trying to get us to update! I still find iOS 17 too buggy.

What are 3 bugs that you experience?

 

[Marshall73]

The ones who haven’t updated probably have entry level devices with the smallest storage and don’t have space to upgrade. Apple need to go back to regular emoji updates to entice the “look at the shiny shiny” brigade to upgrade to get them to have their device security up to date.

 

[Naraxus]

People are slowly catching on to Craig Federighi's game and are getting tired of it. The clown can't code properly to save his life, nor can he teach others the same. Every os release is the same - .0 is plagued with bugs & glitches, then the patches come which typically address some slight issue(s) but introduce even more glitches. Scott Forstall got fired for far far less.

Federighi needs to be show the door & Apple needs to get off this yearly-os-release schedule.

 

[Octavius8]

Don’t “update”, it kills Bluetooth compatibly with cars, speakers, and hearing aids from my 15PM. Hundreds of comlplains in other forums.

 

[AlastorKatriona]

What weird reasoning. Why would the percentage of devices updating ‘early’ decrease when devices increase? Truth is that iOS has been boring for years now. Every ‘major’ update is lacklustre and only has a handful of features most of which very minor or of little interest to most people. If Apple wants people to update it has to start again making iOS exciting with major new features.

Good question. The number of devices updating to the latest OS doesn't decrease, it increases. But it's only the percentage of total devices that Macrumors always highlights, which is a misleading and meaningless statistic. Maybe that wasn't clear in my post.

 

[allenvanhellen]

Why would I downgrade from a mature, stable, relatively bug-free OS — iOS 16.5 — to something practically still in beta? I’m worried about the Music app screwing up my library. And there is no list of features taken away by the update (there always are a few at least) . I need transparency and stability before I update. Also, the lack of a dark mode for watchOS 10 — ironic since dark mode practically started for Apple with the Watch — makes iOS 17 even less necessary for me.

 

[Dylan33x]

iOS 17 works great on my 13 mini, but I made the mistake of installing it on my 6th-gen iPad and it's pretty much unusable now. It's now constantly running out of RAM, apps freezing up, web pages not loading... and this was after wiping it and doing a clean install, putting nothing back on the device and turning off iCloud syncing. It can barely do its most basic functionality of email and web browsing.

Reddit will disagree but iPads you definitely have to hold back. My 6th gen is on 14 Still.

 

[Dylan33x]

Why would I downgrade from a mature, stable, relatively bug-free OS — iOS 16.5 — to something practically still in beta? I’m worried about the Music app screwing up my library. And there is no list of features taken away by the update (there always are a few at least) . I need transparency and stability before I update. Also, the lack of a dark mode for watchOS 10 — ironic since dark mode practically started for Apple with the Watch — makes iOS 17 even less necessary for me.

You can use your watchOS 9 watch with iOS17. Speaking from experience. If you have to re-pair, it’ll try and force and update but i was able to get around it by force restarting both devices.

I’m someone who usually advises people to hold back, but at this point unless your phone is 4+ years old, I find 17 to be way more fast and stable that 16. Honestly even most of the betas were.

 

[Dylan33x]

can’t be happier to be on ios 15 on my iPhone 13 pro

I have to say I’m quite jealous.