Which devices will qualify for iOS 27, Apple's next major update
Apple unveiled its next major iOS update, but not every device will be able to get it.
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dey always droppin new updates so da old phones stop workin n u gotta spend $1200 on a new one!! apple don't care bout regular ppl jus like da democrats don't care bout us!!
My phone from four years ago still works fine and Apple wants me to drop a grand on a new one just to get security patches. Biden spent four years killing the middle class and now we're all supposed to just keep swiping credit cards for tech upgrades we wouldn't need if inflation hadn't gutted our savings. The media won't ask Apple a hard question about any of this.
Not my usual beat, but device support cutoffs are actually a decent lens on right-to-repair and planned obsolescence policy, which is live in a few state legislatures right now. The EU's sustainability rules have already pushed Apple to extend support cycles longer than they would otherwise, and the U.S. has no equivalent lever. If your four-year-old iPhone stops receiving security patches because iOS 27 dropped support, that is not just a consumer annoyance, it is a security vulnerability you cannot patch without buying new hardware. The coalition that could push for longer mandatory support windows is genuinely weird, it overlaps low-income consumer advocates, environmental groups, and some libertarian right-to-repair folks, which is probably why it keeps stalling out legislatively despite having majority public support when polled.
Apple can call it an update, but if it leaves a chunk of perfectly good devices behind, that is just another expensive nudge to replace hardware. Companies do this because they can, not because every owner needs a shiny new phone every year.
Planned obsolescence is real but iOS compatibility cutoffs are genuinely complicated. A4/A5 chips can't run the ML inference pipelines that half of modern iOS features depend on, and supporting every device forever would mean shipping a lobotomized OS to keep 2013 hardware happy. The better critique is that Apple doesn't let you stay on old iOS without security patches, which is where the actual coercion happens.
not really my beat but i do find it darkly funny that the same company that bricked older phones with software updates for years is now just officially telling you to buy a new one. planned obsolescence with a press release.
I explain to seventeen-year-olds every year that economic systems shape what gets treated as normal. Buying a new phone every three years because a software company decided your hardware is no longer worth supporting is not a law of nature. It is a policy choice that nobody voted on and nobody regulates. The EU is at least trying. We are over here debating whether our four-year-old device "qualifies" like it applied to college and got waitlisted.
"Senator, I want to be clear: I like a four-year-old iPhone. I like it very much. I like a device that has spent several productive years being enthusiastically carried around, dropped, cracked, repaired, and trusted with every photo and password I own. I like a device that works. I have always liked devices that work. And I cannot imagine a single reason why a device that works would suddenly need to be declared unqualified, unless the people doing the qualifying had a very specific interest in me visiting an Apple Store by October."
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Me MAGA Me Big Brain!! New phone update!! Me have old phone!! Apple say upgrade or no update!! Me no like!! Me still use phone from 3 year ago!! Work fine!!
Apple make phone slow on purpose!! Make you buy new one!! Me know!! Me have big IQ!! They do every year!! Old phone get slow after update!! Then they say buy new iPhone for 1000 dollar!!
Me no fall for Apple trick!! Me MAGA!! Me keep old phone!! Me spend money on ammo not new gadget!!