A few years ago, I was on the “new iPhone every year” plan. Every year, I’d get the new iPhone, and trade in my old one. It wasn’t much more expensive than buying an iPhone every two years, like I had been doing before that. I trusted the recycling process, but I can now see how foolish that decision was. Obviously, the best way to reduce waste is to not make it. No recycling program is perfect, and I was creating waste. It was foolish and selfish. But what did I get for it? Not much. Perhaps that’s why I haven’t felt tempted to trade in my iPhone 13 mini yet.
Apple’s iPhones used to get a large update every two years, and a less significant speed and camera improvement every other year. However, they stopped doing this a few years ago. Instead, every update is a slight improvement on the year before. Case changes are rare, with the iPhone featuring the same basic design for the past five years, just a slightly larger camera bump. This year it’ll supposedly take up the entire top of the phone. People love camera bumps, right?
Performance improvements have been negligible each year, no longer feeling like the large boost they once were. Battery life hasn’t improved the way people want, likely to serve as a reason for people to “upgrade” their iPhone in two years, when the battery degrades to a point that it becomes a frustration. They instead make slightly bigger screens, something no one has been asking for since Apple finally made an iPhone screen that took up the entire front of the phone. If you’ve been paying attention to the evolution of the iPhone since the beginning, the past few years were likely a disappointment. Hell, one of the biggest selling points for the last iPhone won’t even come out until well after the next iPhone is released!
It’s time to admit a difficult truth: you don’t need a new iPhone. Unless something is wrong with your current one, or Apple has stopped updating it, you simply won’t need a new iPhone this year. It’s time to stop mindlessly consuming iPhone updates.
Broken Promises and Missing Features
Note: I don’t recommend buying Google’s spying devices either
When Apple revealed the latest iPhone, the iPhone 16, they touted the new AI features it would be capable of, including AI-enhanced Siri. However, those features never came. In fact, Apple has admitted that they won’t be ready until sometime in 2026. Continuous delays mean even that is potentially an early estimate. The update, if it comes out when Apple has promised, wouldn’t even be an exclusive to the iPhone 16, as it would be months after the release of the iPhone 17. Apple’s unique and magical feature for the iPhone 16 lineup wasn’t even something that came out during its short 1-year “lifetime.” The issue has even lead to lawsuits and mockery from competitors like Google.
When Apple’s improvements year over year are so small that they have to make up features that aren’t going to be ready for over a year after the product launch, it’s the clearest admission from Apple itself that the company is selling you bullshit every year. Apple’s biggest features were a lie last year. Are you going to fall for it two years in a row?
Little More than Planned Obsolescence
The real reason for each of these new, barely-improved iPhones seems to be introducing features that will reach older iPhones, but not work well on them. The clearest indicator of this for me has been all the processing they’ve added to photos, which make taking photos on my iPhone 13 mini and editing them slower than it ever has been. It’s a frustrating process that has even lead to my device crashing on occasion. I can’t turn these features off. That frustration alone might have lead to me upgrading my iPhone, if Apple still released any iPhones that were pocket and hand-sized. Instead, they’re bloated, fragile messes, with just about everyone breaking their screen at least once per phone generation because they’ve become too unwieldy to hold. I suppose that’s another way Apple’s design leads to more purchases.
You really don’t need it. Benchmark differences between models no longer show vast improvements, just a small yearly bump. New features don’t release for the iPhone they’re promised for. Truthfully, the only reason to upgrade anymore is because Apple’s planned obsolescence has gotten so frustrating on your device that you have to upgrade. If you can still live with your iPhone today, there’s nothing the next iPhone can give you except the same frustrations you currently have in a year or two.
Stick With Refurbished or Your Current Device
Apple’s planned obsolescence is sneaky. Your old device will “slow down” as it’s asked to do more for new features you can’t turn off or reject. New photo processing may make taking photos a pain in the ass on older devices because they’re doing processing tasks made for newer processors. Apple can claim to be supporting older devices, while slowly crippling them. Each new device only really creates two things: a hole in your bank account where $900 used to be, and more waste.
Unless “Tim Apple” is bribing you with gold bar gifts, keep the phone you’re using. Otherwise the “recycled” gold in your old iPhone may just end up padding the pockets of corrupt politicians instead of ending up in new devices. If you really need a new device, perhaps look into a refurbished one from the previous model year. It’s not like the newest iPhones will offer a vast improvement, and you’ll at least be saving a product from a landfill. Or from being melted into Apple’s next bribe to avoid Trump’s tariffs.