iPhone Loyalty Hits 96.4% as Android Users Four Times More Likely to Switch

[Steve Adams]

Liquid Glass is big nothing burger outside a minor but loud echo chamber. Most of the regular folks don’t care.

No, the "regular folks" just don't know what it is. I have have hundreds of people come into the store here complaining about their iPhone being "different" and don't know how it happened. Most want it reverted back to the way it was, and are very upset when I can't do that.

 

[Serrafemme]

So most Android users want to stay with Android and most iOS users want to stay with iPhone. This isn’t surprising at all…though the article’s title does seem a bit misleading to make the reader think Android users are mostly jumping over to iOS.

 

[polyphenol]

From where I am, I'd rather stick with an older, lower-cost, iPhone than go through the effort of changing.

But if I did change, I'd consider whether I really need a modern smartphone with IOS or Android. Maybe a cheap phone, maybe one of the "open" phones? I have my iPad mini with me much of the time anyway.

 

[Leigh-zed]

We'll see how this changes once OS Level Age Verification rolls out across the rest of the world.

 

[Corefile]

I would use an iPhone if it was free like my Android phone. I don't want to pay money.

 

[theluggage]

EU: “It’s anticompetitive that only Apple can sell the Apple iPhone. So, as a part of the gatekeeper regulations under the DMA, they will be forced to allow other companies to sell iPhones. It’s the only way companies that don’t make the iPhone can compete.”

That's total nonsense of course - I assume you were going for satire but it's hard to tell these days.

No rules against having a successful proprietary brand. Nobody is telling Apple that they have to allow third party iPhones. The problem is when you use one dominant product to leverage an advantage over other products and services. E.g. using a popular phone or OS to control the phone app or online payment market. Companies don't get sanctioned for having "dominant market positions", they get sanctioned for abusing dominant market positions.

From this sort of post you'd think the EU were victimising Apple. Google. Android and the Play Store are already on the same list of DMA Gatekeepers as Apple/iOS/App Store, so they're subject to the same rules:

DMA designated Gatekeepers

European Commission designated for the first time six gatekeepers - Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, Microsoft - under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). In total, 22 core platform services provided by those gatekeepers have been designated.

digital-markets-act.ec.europa.eu

Google have already been fined by the EU over things like force-bundling the Google App Suite with the Play store.

Meanwhile, in the Land of the Free, broadly the same issues that the EU deals with by government regulation are being thrashed out (at great expense to the participants and at great profit for the lawyers) in the civil courts. Oh, wait, that's still the government (https://www.trumanlibrary.gov/education/three-branches/three-branches-of-government). So I'm not sure where the moral high ground is here...

 

[coolfactor]

My biggest observation ... ignorance. Those that choose Android, largely Pixel and Galaxy devices, are blind to the true advantages of iOS over Android. Those in the Google ecosystem are the most die-hard.

I've observed a few Android users become so frustrated trying to access ordinary text messages that they've received, and they end up saying that they hate texting, but are happy to use Facebook Messenger since it's "easier to find", or some such nonsense.

 

[SnowCrocodile]

there's more than one manufacturer that makes Android smartphones. its not just Google and Samsung. another good manufacturer is one plus, they regularly push out updates, major OS updates and security updates.

I’m not into Chinese hardware if I can help it.

 

[The_Gream]

I’m allergic to lightning charging iPhones, should’ve been USB-C from the start

USB Tyle-C didn’t come out tell TWO years after Lightning, so you wanted another 2 years of 30 pin?

 

[The_Gream]

"SellCell's survey was limited to 5,000 U.S. respondents." (in the final paragraph, should have been in the Headline!)

Remember the World is bigger, much much bigger, than the US. For example, there are more iPhone users in China than in the US. Their switching habits might be different, same for other parts of the world.

just point something out. Both China and India have way more people then every other country.

Quick search

Population by Country (2026) - Worldometer

List of countries and dependencies in the world ranked by population, from the most populated. Growth rate, median age, fertility rate, area, density, population density, urbanization, urban population, share of world population.

www.worldometers.info

India and China both have 1.1+ billion more people than the USA, which is number 3 with 350ish million people.

 

[slippery-pete]

No, the "regular folks" just don't know what it is. I have have hundreds of people come into the store here complaining about their iPhone being "different" and don't know how it happened. Most want it reverted back to the way it was, and are very upset when I can't do that.

Outside of this board, I haven't heard one person complain, make a comment, ask "WTF" about liquid glass. This board makes up an incredibly small part of Apple's customer base and not really what Apple is targeting with their releases.

 

[FatLouie]

Outside of this board, I haven't heard one person complain, make a comment, ask "WTF" about liquid glass. This board makes up an incredibly small part of Apple's customer base and not really what Apple is targeting with their releases.

Of the several friends I have with phones that have Liquid Glass, everyone hates it. None of them is on the 'boards'. They have better things to do.

Polls are seldom accurate or reflective of the true situation, just as with Apple fanbois.

 

[dzankizakon]

I can copy a text or images on my iPhone and it magically shows up in my Mac's clipboard.

Except when I copy something on my iPhone and Paste does nothing on my Mac sitting right next to it. At home, connected to home wifi, everything on the latest OS, BlueTooth (as always) enabled, logged into the same iCloud account etc etc. But then I magically restart Mac or iPhone and Copy/Paste between them starts ‘magically’ working. Continuity, iCloud tabs, Copy/Paste, AirDrop and similar near-network tech has been very unreliable for years on Apple devices. I don’t know exactly what stack does it rely upon (probably a mixture of BT, Bonjour, IP, WiFi, god knows what else), but it’s just unreliable. I sometimes want to send pictures to my wife and she insists on iMessage because she unknowingly and instinctively associates AirDrop with problems and frustration.

 

[FatLouie]

Android phones may be cheaper than iPhones, but they don’t get updates as often or for nearly as long. I don’t switch phones all that often so iPhone’s long term support is important.

I have had two updates this year on my OPPO Find X9 Pro, ColorOS. Yesterday, the rollout for OPPO ColorOS 16.1 beta started. Maybe Samsung is slow, but the other manufacturers are more aggressive.

 

[slippery-pete]

Of the several friends I have with phones that have Liquid Glass, everyone hates it. None of them is on the 'boards'. They have better things to do.

Polls are seldom accurate or reflective of the true situation, just as with Apple fanbois.

Its always interesting, everyone hates ios 26 but the adoption rate is roughly 66%.

I love the "Apple Fanbois" moniker. We need to come up with a cute little nickname for whiners who complain about anything/everything Apple does. Hmmmm

 

[SnowCrocodile]

Pixel has 7 years of support, I think that's the same as apple if I'm not mistaken

I got burned by Google way too many times. Bought their 12” tablet when it came out, mainly for business travel. That line had problematic memory chips that caused it to severely lag after about 7 months, then an update turned it into essentially a paperweight, and Google pretty much refused to do anything about that. Then they kept killing services I used. I’m sure that Pixel is a great phone (aside from the entire spying thing) but the whole ecosystem is way too unpredictable.

Same with MS. I like Windows ecosystem overall, but will stay away from MS branded hardware. Every MS hardware I relied on was either killed altogether (Windows Mobile / Windows Phone) or had major features disabled (HK Invoke) or was just an overall disappointment (Surface Pro).

 

[maerz001]

Whole family is on Apple devices. The ecosystem integration is much more important to me than the cost of an individual device or the features on an individual device. So no Windows or Android in the house (apart from a work laptop).

Yep, thats called the golden cage😉

 

[Non-Euclidean]

This is why Apple shouldn't worry so much about being "behind" on AI. They are doing just fine without it.

The mindset of corporate need for AI 2-3 years ago is 500-1000% greater than the current public demand for AI right now.

 

[Steve Adams]

Outside of this board, I haven't heard one person complain, make a comment, ask "WTF" about liquid glass. This board makes up an incredibly small part of Apple's customer base and not really what Apple is targeting with their releases.

As I stated, I work in a Carrier Store here in Canada, and I have had hundreds of people come in complain about "what's happened to my iPHone". They don't know about liquid glass, or updates etc, they know that they woke up and their phone looks completely different and things are moved from where they normally were in the settings menus etc.

 

[SnowCrocodile]

The mindset of corporate need for AI 2-3 years ago is 500-1000% greater than the current public demand for AI right now.

Yes, while AI is here to stay, it does look like it was oversold to the C-suites.

 

[FatLouie]

Its always interesting, everyone hates ios 26 but the adoption rate is roughly 66%.

I love the "Apple Fanbois" moniker. We need to come up with a cute little nickname for whiners who complain about anything/everything Apple does. Hmmmm

How about "Honest" or maybe "Realists"?

As for the adoption rate...I doubt that figure is entirely accurate. Most of those users woke up one morning to find 26 on their phones. Had they disabled automatic updates and waited to read how well or how poorly 26 was doing, I suspect the adoption rate would be much lower. Users tend to resent a well-known GUI to them, being suddenly messed up.

 

[ChrisMac47]

I’m not into Chinese hardware if I can help it.

Interesting, how you tell where your iPhone is made (before buying it)? Most iPhones are still made in China. China is No 1 for quality, by a mile.

 

[Abazigal]

So most Android users want to stay with Android and most iOS users want to stay with iPhone. This isn’t surprising at all…though the article’s title does seem a bit misleading to make the reader think Android users are mostly jumping over to iOS.

I feel like by and large, there's a net influx of of users from android to iOS, compared to the other way around.

It's probably not big enough to see any real cause for concern, yet at the same time, Apple continues to grow their active install base and benefit from it. The real story is how Apple continues to leverage this growing user base by way of app sales, subscriptions, the payment by Google (which I suspect also increases every year, meaning the reported $20 billion is way outdated), Apple Pay, and (soon) ads from Maps.

A normal android smartphone OEM doesn't see any extra revenue after the sales of the device. It essentially just becomes another vessel for Google services and Google reaps the benefits thereafter.

This is the true power of the Apple ecosystem. The decision by Tim Cook to double down on this continues to pay handsomely years on.

 

[ChrisMac47]

just point something out. Both China and India have way more people then every other country.

Quick search

Population by Country (2026) - Worldometer

List of countries and dependencies in the world ranked by population, from the most populated. Growth rate, median age, fertility rate, area, density, population density, urbanization, urban population, share of world population.

www.worldometers.info

India and China both have 1.1+ billion more people than the USA, which is number 3 with 350ish million people.

Yes, of course, that emphasises my point that the World (of Apple) is much much bigger than the US Market. But as MacRumors is both US-based and US biassed, one would never know!

 

[TheMacDaddy1]

Went from an 16 Pro Max to a Pixel 10 Pro XL. Could not be happier. All the apps I used are on Android and work just the same. No Liquid Slop and the keyboard is 1000% better.

I was already a long time user of Google apps as Apple apps like Photos have just declined.