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This is (basically) just inferential statistics.

Similar to the same inferences that brought US to where we are.

They've done the science . . . it's up to us to interpret the results :)
 
And this is a credible survey…..
Have you read the actual survey results? It appears to have been a good faith survey conducted by a real company that does surveys. And the results appear to be credible to me.
100% of people who expressed an interest in upgrading their phones said that they were interested in buying a new phone to replace their old phone.

In reality, I honestly do not believe that 70% of iPhone owners around the world are going to buy a phone from the iPhone 17 range.

I'd want to know more about how SellCell selected these 2,000 U.S.-based iPhone users, and exactly what questions they were asked in the survey.
SellCell did not conduct the survey themselves. They contracted with a company that does surveys as their business. I encourage you to read the actual survey results.
Were they self-selecting? Did they enter the survey by clicking on a link from, say, sites advertising or promoting iPhone 17 or accessories? Did the survey ad / link / pop up say something like "Are you going to upgrade to an iPhone 17? If so, please take part in our survey....."
I did not see any references to that, but because it's a survey done by a professional survey company, I would expect that the respondents were randomly chosen from a pool of current iPhone users.

Surveys need to properly limit scope (in this case, iPhone users only). I would be interested to know if the respondents were US iPhone users only, or if they went international, and by how much. Once you've defined the scope, only a completely randomized selection process is will ensure validity of the survey, and the survey company likely already knows this. After all, doing surveys is their business, and they have to get it right if they still want to have a business.

I'm not a survey professional, but 2,000 strikes me as an appropriate number for the survey. It's not likely that the results would be "significantly more accurate" or even "significantly different" if they had doubled that number to 4,000. Sure, instead of "68.8%" for one answer, you might get 69.1% for that same question with a higher pool of people. But does that REALLYL make a big difference? Two-thirds is two-thirds, and both of these numbers are closer to two-thirds than anything else.

Never forget that increasing the survey pool will always raise cost of doing the survey, and that requires more personnel and more time.

I think the survey was done in good faith and that the findings are "close enough to make business decisions on."
100% of people waiting in line in MacDonalds want to eat or drink something. That does not mean 100% of all people want to eat or drink.
Not always true. I once waited in the line at McDonalds (the correct spelling) to tell them that they were out of soap and paper towels in the men's room.

But even so, you're still making my point. I might have been .0000000001% of all customers who didn't want to eat or drink. But that would leave 99.9999999999% who did. Round up, and you get 100%. My point exactly.
70%…
Really?

I find that incredibly hard to believe. Who did they survey?
Could it be off? Yes. Could it be off by 10% in either direction? Possibly, but probably not. But if they were (and a 10% variance would be HUGE), then it's either 69.3% or 70.7%.

I think the survey is probably accurate enough.
Any kind of poll can be taken with a grain of salt. I’m going to upgrade from my iPhone 14 but I doubt 70% of people with iPhones are upgrading.
Sure, any poll can be off. But by how much? In this case, I say it won't be off by a lot. Read the results for yourself if you doubt my claim that this was a well-conducted poll with well-thought-out poll questions.
70% is not believable.
And this is where people get themselves into trouble. You're relying on your own bias to make that statement. The whole reason anybody does a poll is to remove personal opinion as a factor.
2,000 users?

That’s it, bring the super cycle comments NOW!
I don't know what that means.
...I'm a little tempted by the new shiny, but I know it's just empty calories. Still, I'll wait to see what new wonders they promise at the announcement event.
Me too!
Not on these forums. Everyone has said it’s ugly and they aren’t buying it. I am though :)
Hahaha! Sometimes I could swear that I can imagine MR is populated by banks and banks of poo-posting monkeys, just like in that Superman movie.
The issue is not necessarily the survey. Average consumer is pretty clueless regarding AI. Some heard about Apple or ChatGPT and that’s it.
Copilot/Gemini is sometimes not even known. Most people have no idea what is Perplexity / Claude / Mistral etc
I agree with you. The average customer is indeed clueless about AI. But I do think the survey was done correctly, and I think the results should at least be reviewed.

Many years ago, one of my colleagues was saying he wanted Bluetooth. "Wait, what?" we said. "Bluetooth!" he insisted. Later it came out that he wanted a Blackberry device. And this is an IT guy!
Most people here are tech enthusiasts, we do not represent average consumers
That is true too. It's entirely possible that 70% of iPhone users in and not in the survey are thinking about buying this time around.
That's a very small sample size to make such broad sweeping generalizations, which really don't apply to Apple's billions of customers at large.
2,000 is not a small sample size.
So is 2,000 US-only based users, to be fair.
I asked that question above. Here's what Google tells me:

US: between 124 million and 155 million
Europe: About 120 million
China: About 70 million
India: About 14 million
Africa: About 14 million
Canada: About 20 million
Central and South America: Unknown

The US represents about 34% of all of those.

Also, I only skimmed the survey results, and I did not see if the respondents were broken into business and personal users. How you respond to a survey question is going to partly depend on who's paying for your upgrade, yes?

Would this survey of 2000 include only US respondents, or might they include Europe and China for more accuracy? But what if one of those countries is in an economic downturn right now, and another is in an uptrend? Will things equal out? Will the survey be somehow more useful with more respondents from overseas?

Or, and I don't know if this is true or not, but what if prior surveys have shown that you don't have to survey the whole planet to get useful answers? Maybe you can survey the US, Canada, the UK, and Germany, and be done with it very economically.

I don't know the answer, and it likely won't be disclosed anyplace where I could read about it.

I would have liked to know more about the pool of respondents. But I'm probably not the person to analyze it and say that the survey is invalid because we didn't poll the mountainous regions of Afghanistan.
“When asked which company leads in AI, 44% named Apple, while both Samsung and Google were selected by 6.6% of respondents. Ten percent of users said no brand currently leads in the AI space.”

This has pretty much nullified all the other statistics of this study for me.
Why should it? The respondents' responses about whether or not they plan to buy has nothing to do with whether or not they can flawlessly identify the current leader in AI technology. That's the part that matters, because the last time I was in the Apple Store, they didn't give me a pop-quiz before they would sell me my iPhone 16.
 
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I use my iPhone camera as my primary camera for work/business purposes so I'll upgrade for the camera alone. Still kind of iffy on that design but maybe it will look better in person.
 
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What is considered an "upgrade" in today's iPhone standards?. New-again color?, more RAM in some versions?, better zoom?, adequate CPU?.
 
What is considered an "upgrade" in today's iPhone standards?. New-again color?, more RAM in some versions?, better zoom?, adequate CPU?.
30% of iPhone customers are probably people that are going to upgrade every year no matter what. It's probably split between people that do it for the image of looking like a tech enthusiast even thought they could care less and the people that actually are tech enthusiasts and genuinely like trying new things.

The Middle 30% of average consumer has no clue. They may upgrade to keep up socially, they may see they're eligible for an upgrade with their carrier and just do it. They have no idea what the real feature and benefits are. The'll see there is a new phone with a 17 on it instead of 16 and that will be enough for them.

Then you have the back 30% made up of the tech literate and financially restricted who'll hold out 3+ years or until their phone breaks.

The remaining 10% are originally from elseehrer on the list, they just happen to have broken/damaged their phone and are buying a new one for that reason.
 
This. I would very quickly give up my 13 Mini for a new Mini but it isn't going to happen. Phablets all the way.
This is why I'm really hoping Apple goes for a Flip iPhone before a Folding iPad mini, but I don't think it will ever happen. I've known 4 people that have an iPhone Pro Max that have complained about how big their phone is. 3 of them have upgraded to another Max in the past year and when asked why say they like the bigger screen. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Also, on the topic of Phablets: I'd immediately buy any phone that had a curved back and was actually designed for a human being with average hands to hold. I had a very short Android phase with the original Moto X and the Moto X2. Both of those phones had amazing industrial/physical designs. The original moto X is still hands down the best physical manifestation of a smart phone IMHO.
 
I have not found any good reason why I should upgrade from my 15 Pro. They even removed the titanium frame. I would rather buy a new car this year than a phone.
 
I went from an 11pro to the 15pro for the always on display, precision find and camera upgrade. All great bumps. If the 17 has similar upgrades I’m in, otherwise what’s the point?
 
title of the macrumors article is WRONG.

title of the macrumors article is:
quote

Survey: Nearly 70% of Users Plan to Upgrade to iPhone 17​

endquote
the original survey report does not say this.

here is the screen grab from the survey site:
Screenshot 2025-09-02 at 15.17.24.png

the original survey answers categories to yield clear responses is flawed.
but even so, the key words in the question are "if you upgrade" which one "would you choose "
how macrumors reads this and reports nearly 70% are upgrading is a mystery.
 
Will be good for Apple. Expecting higher number of devices to be sold closer to Christmas. I am personally looking forward to the 17 Pro Max. Hope the orange Pro Max will finally be available.
 
My upgrade cycle: 6 in 2015 -> 13 mini in 2022 -> 16 pro two weeks before. I just went for the 16 pro to get the titanium frame (I know it makes zero sense), and the better camera.
I miss the 13 mini, liked the size and low weight, but cannot stand lack of the camera macro ability.
 
I will happily upgrade my 13 Mini to another nice, reasonably sized phone that can be operated comfortably with one hand. Oh, what's that? Only ginormous chonguses this cycle? Guess I'll stick with what I have, then.

At this point it seems like my only option will be to get the 5.5" foldable when it comes out, and just never unfold it.
 
I am going to upgrade to the 17 Pro Max from the 13 Pro Max. I am not that excited or looking forward to the upgrade since I won't be noticing any significant changes and I am definitely not looking forward to the camera button as I am a light user. But I am lately noticing that the battery and performance of my 13 Pro Max is significantly degrading and don't predict seeing it running iOS 26 smoothly.

This will be the longest I have even waited to upgrade my phone (usually every 2 years).
 
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