At this point in the film, defining that an iPhone is better than an Android phone or vice versa is at the very least lying. Each one may have their preferences, but the truth is that both hardware and software are very similar. However, in the latter (the software) Apple seems to continue to have a certain advantage. Despite the great advances of Android in recent times.
And this advantage is taken by the Californian company with iOS for two fundamental reasons: the time during which it updates an iPhone and, also, because how you distribute those new updates when they go out. In fact, on that last point there are interesting nuances to comment on after statements made a couple of years ago by Craig Federighi, Apple’s vice president of software.
Updates are faster and more simultaneous
We start from a base that shows the nature of each operating system. Android is not only distributed to the mobile phones of its owner, Google, but is present in dozens of brands that, with greater or lesser customization, also adapt their systems to Android. At Apple, however, they only distribute iOS to their own iPhones. This is where we find the first great advantage and that is that When a new version of iOS comes out, it reaches everyone simultaneously without having to wait weeks or months. They don’t even divide it by region as happens with some Android manufacturers.
However, There is a curious circumstance for those who have automatic updates activated. Perhaps you have already noticed it and that is that when a new version of iOS comes out, from the first minute it is available to anyone who looks for it in the settings of their iPhone. On the other hand, if you skip that search and trust everything to automatic updates, they take time to arrive. A lot, in fact.
Some iOS updates fail. And Apple has a good excuse
These automatic updates do not arrive until after a week or even a month. since that version of iOS was originally released. And this is something that is easily verifiable and has even been confirmed by Craig Federighi. The explanation given by Apple’s top leader in the software area is that in this way they can obtain feedback from users who installed it before, so that if there is a problem, they can solve it without the need for the update to have already arrived. massively. Because yes, despite being in beta for several weeks, it is not unreasonable to see a priori stable versions that later end up causing some problems.
Years of support continue to be an advantage for Apple
Less and less advantage, but advantage nonetheless. Update support on Android has recently been extended up to seven years in many cases. However, it is still not common and there are those who remain mysterious in their support, and others who directly offer 3+2 years (three with full versions and two with security patches). At Apple, although they do not give exact figures, they continue to maintain an average of five years of support for each iPhonein some cases being even older.
There are iPhones with ten years of life that continue to receive updates
The record stands at seven years with complete updates for the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, launched in 2015 with iOS 9 and with support that ended in 2022 with iOS 15. Although the fact that it ended in 2022 is somewhat relative, since it did not receive more complete updates such as iOS 16 or iOS 17, but just a couple of months ago it received iOS 15.8.2 with security patches.
Another extremely striking case is that of the iPhone 5s. It arrived in 2013 with iOS 7 under its belt, continued with complete updates until 2019 with iOS 12 and its last update arrived a little over a year ago, with iOS 12.5.7 with security patches. In this, therefore, we obtained ten years of support in total (six full years and four with security patches).
As for the future, things continue to look good for iOS 18. While it is true that nothing will be confirmed until June 10 at WWDC 2024, leaks suggest that We will once again have a large list of compatible iPhones. The same as with iOS 17, thus leaving the iPhone XS, XS Max and XR equaling the record of the iPhone 6s by supporting complete updates for seven years (they arrived in 2018 with iOS 12).