Rapid adoption of its latest software updates is something that Apple has always been very proud of. The numbers were always so staggering when compared to the fragmented nature of Android, where you'd have most users running one or even two generations behind the latest release, but the vast majority of Apple's users would be running the latest software not long after it was updated.
That's still the case today, even as Android's fragmented nature isn't as bad as it was, thanks to exceptional work done by Samsung and Google in releasing updates faster across all regions. However, Apple has set high adoption benchmarks for itself, and it appears that the iOS 17 has not met them.
iOS 17 sees slower adoption on iPhones compared to iOS 16
Apple has released iOS 17 adoption statistics for the first time ever since the update was released last year. As of now, iOS 17 is installed on 76% of iPhones after being made available to all users in September 2023.
Based on the figures provided by Apple, iOS 16 is still running on 20% of iPhones released in the past four years while only 4% of iPhones run earlier iterations of its OS. 66% of all active iPhones are running iOS 17 while 23% are running iOS 16.
Apple is seeing slower adoption of iOS 17 compared to iOS 16, albeit slightly. iOS 16's adoption was on 81% of all iPhones by the same time compared to iOS 17's 76%. No reasons have been assigned for the slower adoption, even as Apple has since released three subsequent updates so far, with iOS 17.3 being the latest. The next major update, iOS 17.4, is slated to arrive in March.
