zlacker

Apple averages around 6 years of major OS updates, but I think security patch support goes on for much longer than that.

edit: iPhone 5s from 2013 received an update this year

>>369548+(OP)
They certainly have a few outliers. They released 12.5.7 in January 2023, which supports the iPhone 5s and 6 - 10 years after the 5s was initially released! However, that was an outlier; they haven't backported most security patches to older devices.

They only do it when there's clear evidence of in-the-wild exploitation or it's a big compatibility bug that would prevent you from migrating to a newer device.

Google's announcement was for full OS support for 7 years, not just security fixes. Comparing it to Apple's ~6 years of OS support is fair.

>>369548+(OP)
Meanwhile my parents' landline phone lasted for more than 30 years.

>>369548+(OP)
Apple provides only certain highly critical security updates to older devices. There was an Ars Technica article a year ago on Apple’s support policy for security updates. [1] Officially, Apple guarantees security updates for all known security issues only for the latest version of the OS. [2]

Quoting from Apple’s page [2]

> “Note: Because of dependency on architecture and system changes to any current version of Apple operating systems (for example, macOS 13, iOS 16 and so on), not all known security issues are addressed in previous versions (for example, macOS 12, iOS 15 and so on).”

[1]: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/10/apple-clarifies-secu...

[2]: https://support.apple.com/en-us/guide/deployment/depc4c80847...

>>ameliu+18
But then again the only thing it can do is receive and send calls. You didn't buy an iPhone only for the call feature.