Apple had already had Lightning out for 2 years when the new rules came in 2014, I already had four relatively new devices in the house with lightning ports by

Apple had already had Lightning out for 2 years when the new rules came in 2014, I already had four relatively new devices in the house with lightning ports by then. Compared to Micro USB, Lightning is more durable, is fully symmetrical, has built in authentication. At the time in 2014 it also had faster charging (12W vs 8W), faster transfer speeds, and did streamed video and audio all of which Micro USB got several years later. The charging power issue was a big deal because Lightning was suitable for tablets with bigger batteries and higher power ratings (two of our lightning devices in 2014 were iPads). This his is why the Galaxy tablets at the time used a proprietary connector. So Apple would have had to keep Lightning anyway for the iPad. Lightning has also always been more consistent, several variants of Micro USB connectors and cables are incompatible. So much for standardisation. So reverting to Micro USB at the time would have been a significant regression in capability, and wouldn't even have got rid of Lightning because it would still have been needed for the iPad. The whole situation would have been an utter debacle.