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It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. So much of this product page is focused on new software functions that may have some

It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. So much of this product page is focused on new software functions that may have some vague relationship with the slightly upgraded hardware, but that could mostly be released to existing phones. Every new iPhone, Pixel, or Samsung phone basically claims the camera is marginally better and hey, look at these software features that have very little to do with the hardware and should not fundamentally be a reason to upgrade to this phone. There is so much time, effort, and physical waste that is generated by slightly redesigning phones every year purely for the sake of making sales (as opposed to meaningful improvement upon the existing design or introduction of a new hardware feature). Think not only of people upgrading for the sake of it, but all of the cases, screen protectors, and other assorted accessories cast in plastic for previous models that are garbage now. It would be nice if we could just space these things out to 5 years or so now, because that's probably how long it takes for anything to change enough to justify a new model.

karolist 3y ago
Not everyone lives on the same upgrade cycle, you can, but you're not supposed to change your phone every year. With iPhone 15, the majority of people upgrading would be 12 and older device owners.
- kimbernator 3y ago
  That is technically true. However, I do find that a lot of people I know tend to get new phones well before they actually have a need for them. I don't entirely blame peoples' consumerism; As somebody who once worked in cell phone sales, the mere act of visiting a carrier store is likely to land you in front of a salesperson who is incentivized to sell new phones and lines indiscriminately. Not to mention the incredible amount of advertising that goes into phones - if people only upgraded when they needed new phones, I don't think Apple, Samsung, or Google would feel the need to advertise the new ones so aggressively. HN is likely a much more tech-literate crowd than the average person, so I think to a lot of us it seems silly to buy new phones every year. But I know that every time Apple releases a new iPhone, I get a call from my dad asking if it's worth upgrading from last year's model. I say no, nothing has changed, but the next time I see him he has it. Why? Because the salesperson made such a convincing case, not only about the merit of the new phone, but the fact that they could give him such a "deal" on it.
  - kaba0 3y ago
    > lot of people I know tend to get new phones well before they actually have a need for them It might just be your “bubble”, but even if not, is it really that bad of a deal? If you resell your previous phone at 2/3 the original price each year, you can use the latest phone for like 200 bucks for a year, or $17 monthly. For a device that is with you 0-24, and is probably the most often used item a typical person owns — they have it on them more often than even their shoes!
    - Krasnol 3y ago
      Yeah, but in the end they are those who fuel the waste machine. They start it, and they are the reason why there are new phones every year. For no sane reason. Somewhere along the way, you pass a threshold where it's uncool to have a certain version of phone and judging from what you hear about the waste problem with phones, it's above the reasonable moment to get rid of it because it's broken or not usable. I mean, sure it's a nice lie you can tell to yourself, but in the end, it's not good.
      - TeMPOraL 3y ago
        It's not always about being uncool. Sometimes it's about your current device getting slow enough to be annoying, so you want to replace to avoid paying the daily mental tax, "death through thousand papercuts", coming from the single piece of electronics you use most of, day in, day out. And that is caused mostly by software bloat - as mentioned elsewhere in the thread, between OS updates and app updates, a year is about how long a flagship phone has before it starts to become annoying to use. And then it only gets worse.
    - kimbernator 3y ago
      I feel qualified to say it's not just my bubble, having worked in cell phone sales. The business hinges on the fact that people don't run out the useful life of their devices. Incentives exist on the part of the person who, being human, definitely want the new shiny thing, regardless of the logic behind it. They exist for the salesperson, who will get a commission for selling the new shiny thing, regardless of whether this makes the customer's life any better or worse. They exist for the carrier because the customer is on the hook for 2-3 years of service when they buy the shiny thing. Finally, they exist for the company that made the phone because they make a profit on the sale price of the shiny thing.
- ezequiel-garzon 3y ago
  Indeed, Apple compares on its website the iPhone 15 to the iPhone 12: "The A16 Bionic GPU is up to 40% faster than the GPU in iPhone 12" [1]. Maybe unsurprisingly, they don't use this comparison for the Pro line. r/iphone discussion here [2]. [1] https://www.apple.com/mt/iphone-15/ https://www.apple.com/mt/iphone-15/ [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/16h13z3/why_are_they_comparing_a16_with_a14/ https://www.reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/16h13z3/why_are_the...
  - agrippanux 3y ago
    That's an awesome stat in favor of the iPhone 12, which is now 3+ years old.
- awill 3y ago
  I agree. I find upgrading less frequently makes the upgrade so much more significant. Upgrading yearly would leave you complaining and wondering what's new. I know people who lease a new car every 3 years. And often, if there's no redesign, they're getting a nearly identical vehicle. It's strange. Whereas, I upgrade my car every 10 years, and am thrilled with all the improvements.
  - kimbernator 3y ago
    This is fine and good, but the problem is that once your phone is no longer the newest thing, the experience takes a hit because there's little incentive to actually support your device anymore.
  - pfannkuchen 3y ago
    I think the lease thing is more to avoid dealing with any maintenance issues as well as the wear and tear on a less than new car. It’s not to get the newest tech or style all the time AFAIK.
    - epolanski 3y ago
      Avoiding repairs, even if some of them might be expensive, is still insanely cheaper than leasing a new car every 3 days. People lease for many factors, not just to avoid tear and maintenance.
      - TeMPOraL 3y ago
        > still insanely cheaper than leasing a new car every 3 days Somehow that works for clothing vendors, though.
      - pfannkuchen 3y ago
        I don’t understand what you mean by avoiding repairs being cheaper. In order to avoid repairs you need to have a relatively new car all the time, and leasing is an easy way to achieve that. What other reasons do people lease?
- Gigachad 3y ago
  Apple has a few products like the ipad mini and imac that don't release on yearly schedules and it creates this situation where there are good and bad years to buy. Where the product hasn't been refreshed for 3/4 years and is now severely outdated and a major refresh is something like 6 months away. It's pretty bad for the customer and the seller. Meanwhile it's always a good time to buy an iphone. There is no point waiting for the next model because it won't be meaningfully different.
TaylorAlexander 3y ago
It's funny because if they did not release a new phone every year, the old phones would be useful for longer. I recently had to replace my iPhone 7s plus because it was getting so slow I sometimes could not get the camera to open as it loaded the system down too much. This was despite the fact that the system said my battery was not degraded (it had been replaced with Apple Care a couple of times). Of course when it was new the camera opened quickly. And then Apple made their OS more heavy weight every year until my phone slowed to a crawl. And faster phones are nice, but I think it is worth considering how valuable that really is to us as users and a society, especially if the process involves making loads and loads of ewaste and consuming tons of new resources, and all the emissions their mining and transport involves, when we could simply keep our software slim and our old devices functional. And the big companies will never do this. Do we need to force them to allow open software to run on these devices, so that clean builds can be patched and maintained when the company over bloats them or abandons them?
- sanswork 3y ago
  I don't update my phone every year but I also don't really want the progress of software or tech in general determined by the laggards.
  - kimbernator 3y ago
    I think that a new phone release should just be warranted. The trigger should be "we made significant improvements that couldn't be applied in software to the old device" instead of "it's October"
    - sanswork 3y ago
      An improved camera can't be something applied in software, a faster chip can't be applied in software. So by your own standard every version is warranted.
      - kimbernator 3y ago
Eumenes 3y ago
> It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. These companies virtue signal about climate change nonstop, but still manage to produce disposable phones and light up their data centers for advertising and user tracking
yccs27 3y ago
Yeah, it feels like smartphones are finally maturing, and they are no longer new enough to justify the fast release cycles and short support times.
- matsemann 3y ago
  I feel it's a decade since I was excited about a new phone. Now I just copy over my settings and app, and act a bit disgruntled for a week that things are slightly different.
  - CydeWeys 3y ago
    I have a Pixel 7 Pro that I was pretty excited to get, mainly for the 5X optical zoom lens. First time I've had anything like that on a phone. Super nice!
- Gigachad 3y ago
  Cars still release on a yearly schedule decades later and they change almost nothing each year.
  - 0x457 3y ago
    Well no. Car models have generations and mid-generation updates (aka facelift). It's very rare that there are any updates at all within the same generation. Year in model designation is just "ha, look at his looser driving last year BMW" and to show when car left assembly line. There are some examples where the same generation had a significant upgrade without a facelift, but those are rare. One example I could think of is MX-5 (ND): between 2015 and 2018 there were no changes at all, but in late 2019 there was nearly complete overhaul of its powertrain and then a small update in 2021.
    - calvinmorrison 3y ago
      There's almost always year over year changes on the same chassis.
mdgrech23 3y ago
man if you think that's bad let me introduce you to the automobile industry.
- iancmceachern 3y ago
  Fashion too
taway1237 3y ago
I'm currently using Pixel 4a (just recently EOL), and I'll probably upgrade my phone this or next year. Maybe Pixel has a yearly release cycle, but it doesn't mean I have to upgrade every year, that would be crazy. And they can iterate more often to try some ideas more often than once every 5 years.
- jaza 3y ago
  I'm using a Pixel 3 (my first Pixel) that I bought new (in original sealed box) on eBay one year ago, for a bit under AUD$300, still works fine, all the apps keep upgrading (the OS won't upgrade as it's EOL, hasn't been an issue for me so far), the camera AI is impressive enough for me, I'm planning to keep on using it for at least another year. That's as close as I get to having a bleeding edge smartphone. No need to waste $1k+ on the latest and greatest hyped-up kool-aid.
  - sibit 3y ago
    The Pixel 3 is a good phone. I bought one new and used it for ~5 years. The battery was still going strong and my only issue was the USB-C port stopped working.
    - m-p-e 3y ago
      For my Pixel it always helped to clean the USB-C port with a toothpick. That thing attracted so much lint from pocket like no other.
mrinterweb 3y ago
Obviously, companies that sell phones want to sell more phones as frequently as possible. I'm just glad that Google is aware that people value having longer term feature and security support for their products. The new 7 years of feature and security support is pretty fantastic.
0xDEF 3y ago
Nobody is demanding that you buy a new smartphone every year. Modern smartphones have 3-5 years of security/bug updates and the batteries no longer degrade as fast as they used to.
- kimbernator 3y ago
  I bought my pixel 7 early this year because my s20's screen broke and the cost to buy a new one to replace it myself, which is not something I think most people would be willing to do (instead paying even more for someone else to do it), exceeded the cost to buy another S20. On top of that, the moment my 3 year old, perfectly working phone had anything other than a pristine screen, it had zero trade-in value and basically encouraged me to throw it in a drawer or the trash. This was literally Samsung's flagship phone only 3 years prior. That could have probably been mitigated if the s20 remained relevant for more than a year or two and there was a mature parts market that made it feasible to upkeep rather than scrap.
- tootie 3y ago
  Yeah, I think I'm going to pull the trigger on a Pixel 8 and that's partly because I've been rocking a Pixel 4a for several years.
freedomben 3y ago
Normally I agree with you, but I don't think that's the case this year at least. The on-device ML chip (Tensor G3) is a legit difference-maker. A lot of the ML features they are rolling out wouldn't be possible on older hardware. You could do the non-realtime portions in the cloud, but the realtime audio cleanup wouldn't work for example (way too much latency). Also, personally I much prefer on-device. I frequently have spotty data connections so it's very disruptive when stuff relies on cloud connectivity.
- criddell 3y ago
  When I upgrade in two or three years from now, the ML chip will probably be even better than now. My phone has been fine for the past couple of years and the introduction of something on iPhone 15 doesn’t really change that. I don’t mind waiting.
paxys 3y ago
What's silly isn't the fact that they release new smartphones every year but that people feel compelled to upgrade every year. Incremental annual hardware refreshes are great, because everyone who is in the market for a phone can always get the latest and greatest and can be set for several years. For those that give in to the marketing and throw away perfectly usable devices and a thousand+ dollars – well that's nobody's fault but their own.
utopcell 3y ago
Five years ? Why would someone want to experience hardware advances in large steps instead of continuously ?
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- kimbernator 3y ago
  Based on the phrasing of this, I'm not sure if it's meant to be taken sarcastically or not. Apologies if you did mean it that way, because I'll respond seriously: - Advances are mostly software. - Massive quantities of e-waste (and plastic waste via cases, screen protectors, etc). - Perverse incentives by companies to not properly support the user experience on older devices. - Tons of money spent pointlessly.
- iancmceachern 3y ago
  I live this way now. My android phone is more than 5 years old, the tech in my laptop is similar. I'm doing just fine and don't feel like I'm missing out on anything. I run up to date advanced software just like the whole world
matsemann 3y ago
In the iPhone 15 release they wrote "huge leap" 6 times. It felt like something to anchor the perception and to trick journalists to include it in a sentence. But when they say it so much, it kinda shines through that it's mostly just desperate words. "any man who must say I'm the king is no true king" vibes. https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2023/09/apple-debuts-iphone-15-and-iphone-15-plus/ https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2023/09/apple-debuts-iphone-1...
- theodric 3y ago
  It's always the greatest iPhone ever! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPkso_6n0vs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPkso_6n0vs
  - crossroadsguy 3y ago
    The highest number in Apple version history ever! Wait for it …… after last highest 15, we have … ……… 15.0001. Yes!
- animex 3y ago
  The fact that's it's just 15 seems to belie this. I would expect Apple to re-brand once something truly different comes along... that being said all smartphones are becoming long and in the tooth and we're finally starting to see inklings of what might replace our phone addiction in the near-term (audio (buds) + vision, eyeglasses etc.)
dottjt 3y ago
Isn't domain knowledge lost when we don't regularly build and release things? Isn't this why we're struggling to build nuclear in some countries because they weren't building it regularly, and now it's difficult to scale, let alone build new ones? I understand that it's wasteful, but maybe it's necessary to sustain itself? Especially from a feedback perspective from consumers?
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  > I understand that it's wasteful, but maybe it's necessary to sustain itself? Some waste is the cost of resiliency. But with phones (and other electronics and appliances), we're talking about extreme amounts of waste. Way more than is needed to keep around and develop the capacity and know-how. > Especially from a feedback perspective from consumers? What feedback? Unless they screw things really badly, they're just listening to the echoes of their own marketing departments. This is a supply-driven market with high natural barriers to entry. Customers buy what they're told to, and are happy about it as they're told to.
sawyna 3y ago
My pixel 4a 5g works like a charm. 3.5 years and still going fine. I used my pixel 2 for three years so badly. I used it as a hotspot every single day and the number of battery cycles were as if the phone was used for 6 years. My pixel 4a5g takes photos that are on reasonable standards, obviously they won't match match, but it doesn't make a serious difference either to me. I need three things from my phone - battery, camera and lag free user experience. I don't need thinner bezels for gods sake, I can't understand the craze and demand for thinner bezels over a two day battery life.
- theodric 3y ago
  Whatever you do, don't take the Android 14 upgrade. Mine is dogshit slow now. I'm trying to decide if I can be bothered losing all my config and setting it up again with Android 13, or just paying Google for a new phone.
  - _ea1k 3y ago
    It may just need a little while to settle down. I get the feeling a lot of things get updated in the background after the initial upgrade. I noticed that my old Pixel 5 felt really slow for the first 30 minutes or so, but it seems to be returning to normal now.
- sadnessmalaysia 3y ago
  DON'T UPGRADE TO ANDROID 14, I am 4a 5G user, work as charm on last version of Android 13 September version, I feel like a lot of dropping frame while using Android 14. I feel upset and dissapointed towards Google now.
theodric 3y ago
Unfortunately the world is filled with people like my fried who, without fail, buys - for cash, not as part of a contract renewal - the max spec iPhone available every year. One for him, one for his wife. Sell the old ones, or give them to family. Revenue like that is too hard for these companies to pass up. And so we get this waste.
- envsubst 3y ago
  > And so we get this waste. Wait. If they are making phones that get bought up every year because of people like your friend, then where is the waste?
  - phito 3y ago
    In the landfill
    - envsubst 3y ago
      Do you have any information about how much material going to landfills? What if 1 car is 1000 phones?
chaostheory 3y ago
The status quo is great. You have yearly releases that are stable and allow anyone to upgrade without fear of the new model coming out like with traditional video game consoles. No one is forcing you to buy anything you don’t want. Also, the OS and apps need to take advantage of new hardware, so it’s not a surprise if your seven year old phone becomes slower. If you don’t like the status quo then I would go with a non-iOS and non-android phone like pine phone, Mairena, librem, or anything else that based on a more open Linux distro.
- kimbernator 3y ago
  I think it's interesting that you cite video game consoles as a negative. I'd argue the opposite, I think phones should be more like them. With video game consoles, you have a single device where micro-optimizations are constantly done, new features are added, and all software can be purpose-built to work really well on that specific hardware. All of that for ~7 years means a really fantastic user experience and a massive community of people that have collectively worked through solutions to common problems and forced the company's hand on defects (joycon drift, for example). It also means tons of high-quality hardware-specific accessories, both from the company that made the console and from third parties.
  - bravetraveler 3y ago
    I don't see why it couldn't be that way - I see people overstating the hardware revisions. Apple, sure, they innovate. Qualcomm? Hah. For about five years it seemed like every flagship spanning generations was the same SoC
    - fomine3 3y ago
      Meanwhile Apple always do the best (and their older chip like A14 is already enough in today IMO), Qualcomm often hits and miss. Their flagship chip made by Samsung fab is tend to be bad battery life and heat. SD888 to 8 Gen2 upgrade is huge than expected for me.
- hyperhopper 3y ago
AuthorizedCust 3y ago
Your premise is wrong. Old phones that have economic life get cleaned up and re-sold. The fact that manufacturers tweak phones annually does not change this.
- rurp 3y ago
  Based on the numbers I found from a few minutes of searching you are incorrect. Some phones get resold or reused, most do not. Only 25% of people are using a secondhand phone and the phone population is increasing at 5x the human rate.
chiefalchemist 3y ago
The Apple adverts push the fact that the 15 is titanium. That's it. The ad I keep seeing doesn't even hint at why Titanium matters. No matter, the point is, evidently the technical aspects don't seem to matter.
- fomine3 3y ago
  Titanium matters for lightweight that is one of the important spec for some people. They aren't good at advertising this (or don't want to advertise much to make heavier again in the future?)
  - chiefalchemist 3y ago
    But they don't even say that. As if everyone knows that? And no technical improvements? But then again, the new USB C with out of date max data throughput is nothing to brag about.
  - dheera 3y ago
    You wouldn't notice it, the difference in weight between aluminum and titanium phone shell is negligible compared to the weight of the glass, battery, and PCBs combined. Titanium sounds cool, it sounds luxury, it's a marketing hack. Like <strike>"aircraft-grade"</strike> "space-grade" aluminum. Nobody is launching their aluminum phones at escape velocity. It's 100% for marketing reasons. I have some titanium spoons, I feel into the trap too.
    - wilsonnb3 3y ago
      > You wouldn't notice it, the difference in weight between aluminum and titanium phone shell is negligible compared to the weight of the glass, battery, and PCBs combined. The previous iPhone Pro's have a stainless steel shell, not aluminum, and the ~30 gram difference is noticeable. Of course, they caused this problem themselves by using stainless steel rather than aluminum like the regular iPhones, but they are nonetheless solving a problem with the titanium frame.
triceratops 3y ago
You may not buy a new phone every year. But there's always someone who's buying a new phone right now. Why should they have to buy hardware that's potentially almost 5 years old?
- prmoustache 3y ago
  It doesn't seem to annoy people who buy cars. In fact usually cars that were released 5 years before had most of their quirks known and ironed out through a midlife revamp or the model or scheduled preventive replacement of known parts breaking at a specific mileage. Just released one tend to be more of a problem to first gen owners reliability wise. I rely on my smartphone for work, I'd rather buy a 4y old model known to be reliable than a brand knew one that ends up preventing me to call 911 or whose screen die randomly and unexpectedly.
  - rezonant 3y ago
    To be fair, a car is widely expected to last 12 years or longer, has relatively simple software and computer systems, and has no (or limited) access to your personal data. They are also typically a much larger investment. The phone on the other hand is connected to every facet of your life and has a software stack that absolutely contains security flaws waiting to be found and exploited. Apple has always worked to keep devices secure longer, at least up until now having the best long term support. My favorite part of the Pixel 8 is that Google is attempting to match and exceed what Apple's done so far. Phone performance and features are definitely not changing fast enough for older devices to no longer be useful, even for affluent audiences. I hope support windows continue to get longer so that folks who must use or choose to use older devices can remain secure.
    - prmoustache 3y ago
      > The phone on the other hand is connected to every facet of your life and has a software stack that absolutely contains security flaws waiting to be found and exploited. This is an entirely different subject. The software can be upgraded/updated during the life of the mobile phone. And when it comes to chip makers mistakes, which led to vulns like Spectres, they are likely to affect several generations of chips anyway.
oaktowner 3y ago
I agree with much of this post, but I have to take issue with "it's starting to feel silly." The "you need to upgrade your phone every year" concept has been silly from the outset.
- kimbernator 3y ago
  That's totally a fair point, but at least phones were actually adding new features year to year a decade ago. It's fair to have new stuff releasing yearly when you're in the "throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" phase.
dominojab 3y ago
[dead]
maxerickson 3y ago
They are selling millions of each version. There's lots of products where the volume is more like 10,000. The waste isn't in the product that is selling millions...
brokencode 3y ago
A lot of these new software features are enabled by better hardware. Especially AI features, which can require quite specialized and powerful processors. On-device LLMs are the next frontier in personal assistant software, and that can only be enabled by better hardware. Even the image processing for high resolution images can benefit from better hardware. Modern smartphones are heavily dependent on image processing to improve camera quality. Without the right hardware, performance and energy efficiency could be unacceptable.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
bradgessler 3y ago
Try this: don’t upgrade your phone for five years. The annual incremental release cycle is fine—what’s silly is thinking phones need to be upgraded every year.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  > Try this: don’t upgrade your phone for five years. Try that and monitor your quality of life. See if you can avoid therapy. It's not that people think they need to upgrade their phones every year, or two, or three. It's that the phones are designed for short usable life on hardware side, and on software side, neither first-party nor third-party developers give a damn about performance.
  - bradgessler 3y ago
    I upgrade once every 2-3 years on average and my quality of life is great. It’s not on principle either—I will walk into an Apple Store with my existing phone and use it side-by-side with whatever is their latest. If think the new thing improves my life I’ll buy it. Currently I’m using an iPhone 12 Pro Max. Last year when I compared its “lesser camera” to the latest and greatest, I couldn’t tell much of a difference so I kept the old phone. The specs they throw out are always better on paper, but practice upgrading each year will yield very little improvement in quality of life.
  - xyzelement 3y ago
    What is the evidence of this claim? My wife just got to a place where her iPhone got unusable because it's running out of space - mainly having to do with her massive Messages history and photos/videos. We didn't even know until I checked, her phone is the iPhone X which was released 6 years ago and technically nothing is stopping her from using it longer except the lack of desire to prune her message history/photos/vids. My wife is someone who's not going to suffer with a poorly functioning piece of technology nor someone who is going to work hard to optimize it or prolong its life, so the fact that her 6 year old phone works just fine is a good sign that it can, in the average case.
    - 3y ago
mtreis86 3y ago
It makes sense for gaming consoles, I don't see what is so different (these days) about phones.
- TylerE 3y ago
  Game consoles don’t have all the peripherals including the screen soldered directly on.
muxxa 3y ago
Try out https://shop.fairphone.com/fairphone-5 https://shop.fairphone.com/fairphone-5 for a repair/upgrade friendly alternative
- crossroadsguy 3y ago
  It’s still a “fancy” or too niche a phone. It neither has the reach, nor the supply chain backbone. By the time it reaches critical operational/business mass phone landscape would have had changed. Just like it’ll happen with frame.work.
  - berkes 3y ago
    You'll really need to come with some backup of your claims. Because it simply isn't true. FP has been around for 10 years now, making phones, learning, scaling up. They sold close to a million phones every year since 2020 (last year over 1100000 phones). And while a million phones isn't much compared to iPhones or Pixels, it's bigger than many other small phone companies (Chinese or not). They've been diversifying with headphones, and earbuds. And with t he last edition, they finally felt confident with supply chains to guarantee spare parts for decades to come.
madeofpalk 3y ago
This seems divorced from reality. Just because a new phone is released every year, it doesn't mean you need to buy a new one every year. Small, incremental improvements each year means that whenever you buy a new device, it's modern (not using 4 year old components), and substantially 'better' than the previous one.
quicklime 3y ago
If I’m buying a phone 4 years into the cycle, I don’t want to start with a 4-year-old CPU and camera. 5 years later, when I’m ready to get a new phone, that’ll be a 9-year-old CPU and camera. I’d rather have the latest tech when I buy it, and use it until it stops working. I agree though that the physical design should stay the same, so that cases and accessories don’t need to be thrown away. Apple more-or-less does this with the iPhones, eg a case should work with any iPhone 12-14.
tootie 3y ago
Tell it to the car industry. They invented it and it's been going strong.
- rrrrrrrrrrrryan 3y ago
  Both car and phone trade ins get resold and used until their actual EOL, no? I imagine most of these Pixel 8s that physically survive to year 7 (no cracked screen, etc) will have been traded in and will continue to be used in the 3rd world.
deleted 3y ago
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tshaddox 3y ago
I think it's more likely that if they spaced the releases out to every 5 years, there would just be a 5x reduction in the pace of changes, and you could issue the same complaint "Why do they release every 5 years when hardly anything changes?" It's not like the incremental physical changes just automatically happen independently of designing, mass manufacturing, and releasing new phone models. The incremental physical changes happen because companies are trying to develop new phone models.
roland35 3y ago
I remember how much I wanted every new phone before - back in the days of my Motorola Droid there was always some awesome new feature or development. Now, the only reason I upgrade is if the phone ends up damaged or unusable.
rcarr 3y ago
I think the market agrees with you as well. The going rate for a 512GB Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra in like new condition is somewhere in the £600-£700 region. The equivalent S23 Ultra, with only minor specification differences as far as I can see, is currently retailing at £1399. That's a gigantic depreciation for a phone that's only a year and a half old. Phones used to depreciate much slower 5 - 10 years ago.
megraf 3y ago
I've started thinking about cars like this too. We shouldn't have yearly models, it's an absolute waste
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
dmead 3y ago
no no, you should just separate your papers and plastics and keep buying the pocket super computer every year.
- aembleton 3y ago
  Do you also buy a new car when a model update comes out? Do you a new laptop every time a new one gets released? You don't have to get the latest phone all of the time.
mancerayder 3y ago
>functions that may have some vague relationship with the slightly upgraded hardware But never scaling up the damned battery above and sometimes even at demand. It's ultimately my number one request, and I'm sure that of many others.
losvedir 3y ago
I think counterintuitively there's less waste this way. With yearly, incremental releases, people will evaluate what's new from their phone and most people will update on their own cycle, probably every few or several years. Meanwhile, with gaming console "generational" releases every few years, that is a strong incentive for everyone to upgrade. If I have a 3 year old phone which I'm on the fence about updating, then I might pass on this year's model and go for next year's. But if there won't be another phone for 3 more years I guess I might as well get this one.
- manicennui 3y ago
  A lot of people are on 2-year payment plans through their provider and just switch every time.
  - eru 3y ago
    Yes, but those plans cost extra compared to one that doesn't have this feature. (And don't many plans come with some sort of discount, if you don't upgrade your phone?)
    - sudosysgen 3y ago
      Not in every country/region, unfortunately. In my case it's cheaper to upgrade my phone and sell my previous phone than get a BYOB device by a significant margin.
      - eru 3y ago
        Yes. Though in terms of physical waste that the original commenter brought up, selling your old phone for someone else to use makes that upgrade a pretty good option. We could look at the total amount of years any phone is used and abstract away from who uses it. Slightly stylised, if we have four people, Alice, Bob, Charles and Dave, and Alice gets a new phone every year, Bob buys Alice's old phone, Charles buys Bob's old phone, and Dave gets Charles' old phone, then everyone changes phones every year, but each phone is still used for a full four years.
macintux 3y ago
Apple has, what, roughly 1 billion iPhone users right now. Imagine if they only released a new design every 5 years. They'd have to manufacture another billion iPhones in a relatively short window of time to handle all of the upgrades.
heroiccocoa 3y ago
But phones are manufactured regardless, so why not let the people who are currently in the market for a new device get something current? The yearly release cycle isn't meant to be kept up with every year, in fact I think that that notion is so hilariously out of touch basically everywhere except the US (and a small international wealthy elite elsewhere) that it would be ridiculed. Remember, the global median per-capita household income is only $2,920 per year. That's not "the poor", that's the median. 99% of the world would never have even considered buying an iPhone 15 or similar after having an iPhone 14, let alone feel pressured to do so.
- stickfigure 3y ago
  I've been consistently upgrading every 3 years since the Nexus days and I really don't think I'm missing anything. With trade-in, it ends up being something like $50/yr (I always go for the budget versions). Unless you're already sitting on FU money, I don't understand why anyone would spend more.
  - ccooffee 3y ago
    > Unless you're already sitting on FU money, I don't understand why anyone would spend more [than $50/yr on phone upgrades]. Among the people I know, there's more people living paycheck to paycheck and getting annual phone upgrades than people with FU money doing upgrades. That said, the percentage of FU money upgraders is higher than the percentage of paycheck-to-paycheck upgraders. Google/Samsung/Apple/etc may be making more total money from the not-well-off than the well-off, at least thinking about people I know.
    - tyre 3y ago
      There's a point at which something like a new smartphone isn't a status symbol anymore. Among wealthier people, having an iPhone 11 isn't less of a signal than a day one iPhone 15.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
syndacks 3y ago
It’s almost as if these companies have a strategy to grow their business.
8jef 3y ago
As someone who's mostly buying used tech, or newish at deep discounted price from classifieds or ebay, I appreciate not having to wait 5 years cycles for stuff. Yearly release cycles means people let go sooner of perfectly functioning high end tech very fast, selling for very cheap, and I'm very grateful for that. Great many containers filled with stuff from rich countries find their way to poor countries, some include stolen goods (like cars), others include garbage, most include goods that still have some value for other people, including tech. Maybe the problem should be looked at from that angle, and maybe there's no problem, really. One's garbage will always be another one's treasure.
- interpenetrate 3y ago
  [flagged]
envsubst 3y ago
The price system is how our society allocates resources. The fact that people are allocating their own resources to buy one -- without any perverse incentives or being compelled, indicates it's not wasteful to them. A better example of waste is when local governments funds things which people don't use. I think the root of this sentiment is misunderstanding or lack of satisfaction at the system level.
scarface_74 3y ago
How is it “physical waste”? No one is forcing you to buy a new phone and in the case of iPhones, Apple has released security updates in the past year for all iPhones introduced in the last decade. I have an iPhone 12 Pro Max that is three generations behind now. While there is nothing I have to have, the always on display, the USB 3 speed, and video out to my portable USB-C monitor on the iPhone 15 Pro would be nice.
4m1rk 3y ago
> as opposed to meaningful improvement upon the existing design or introduction of a new hardware feature I just wish they kept the pixel 4 design and only improved the battery life. I would pay more for it than this new design.
ako 3y ago
This has nothing to do with phones, but products in general. Many product companies try to release new product versions very year. Not because they expect customers to update every year, but because buyers looking for a new product want to buy the newest to ensure the product is not outdated soon. And the older version can be sold to price sensitive customers, so it allows product companies to get higher margins for new products.
wg0 3y ago
And - price is ridiculously high. $1000+ for what? I don't know about others but my phone camera is only used for scanning QR codes rarely or taking occasional pictures of family (not a picture every hour) which even lower range phones (300 USD or so) do damn decent given it's not dark. My 98% of the usage is to read something. Some website, email or ebook. Why do I need 120 Hz display for that? Gaming? That's always going to be inferior to even a console let alone a gaming PC.
- mda 3y ago
  Many people takes thousands of pictures / videos with their phones yearly.
em3rgent0rdr 3y ago
Landline phones, for comparison, were bought once and lasted ~30 years.
someonehere 3y ago
I agree. I was convinced I need to move from an iPhone 14 to iPhone 15. My reasoning was better camera. I honestly was going to skip upgrading but the camera and some other minor features were enough for me to make the upgrade happen. I feel if these companies worked together to cut back on the waste of yearly release cycles, there’d be better environmental results. But every year we have a new feature because tech has caught up with demand. Not sure what the middle ground is.
- Freak_NL 3y ago
  What is stopping you from just using your old phone until it actually needs replacing? I have a Pixel 6 which takes excellent photos. In two years time, it will still take excellent photos, regardless of what the Pixel 8 or 9 or 10 does.
- light_hue_1 3y ago
  They keep selling a better camera. Constantly. Every year. Yet, can you really look at your old photos and say "my God, those 2017 photos. Could you imagine taking such crappy photos with such a bad phone?" I doubt it. That hasn't been true in more than a decade even for challenging environments like in low light. They're selling you on a better camera each year because there's basically no useful way to measure its impact anymore aside from in really technical conditions that don't affect anyone practically.
  - jerojero 3y ago
    Well, when they added a wide lens camera to phones I think that significantly changed phone photography. In the Pixel 7 pro (and the 8 pro) they added a telephoto lens; this is another significant upgrade. Personally, I have a proper camera, but I am not carrying it around with me at all times. My phone takes excellent pictures (I have a pixel 6) but I do feel the lack of zoom. The quality of the main cameras hasn't really gone up in a few generations; but I do think there's been significant improvements in the photography department in phones in the last 5 years. Wide lens, macro photography, zoom lenses. These are genuine innovations. It does make me a bit angry when software is kept locked into new models when older models are perfectly capable of running it though. But there's been hardware innovation for sure. Don't really see much of a reason to go from a Pixel 7 pro to a Pixel 8 pro, and probably not going to be the case for a few years. But who knows.
kwanbix 3y ago
I was thinking the same the other day, and cannot agree more. A bi-annual release cycle should cut waste in half. Companies keep polluting the world, as if we had another alternative to live on.
pjmlp 3y ago
For my point of view they can release as often as they wish, I will only replace my phones when they die or get stolen.
rsynnott 3y ago
> Think not only of people upgrading for the sake of it This is actually a very small part of the market. Virtually no-one upgrades their phone every year. 3-4 years is more typical.
rkagerer 3y ago
Yeah. They couldn't even give us an ultrasonic fingerprint reader, which is one feature that would have convinced me to buy this instead of the 7. The brighter screen and 1TB model are the only upgrades I find compelling.
addicted 3y ago
An annual release cycle isn’t for people who bought the phone last year. It’s for people who bought their phones 2 or 3 years (or even more) ago. The question is how does this phone compare to the Pixel Pro 6 or 5, not how it compares the 7.
raincole 3y ago
> Every new iPhone, Pixel, or Samsung phone basically claims the camera is marginally better and hey, look at these software features that have very little to do with the hardware and should not fundamentally be a reason to upgrade to this phone. But the software development is driven by the profit from hardware sales. Why would they improve the software if it doesn't make money? I guess in the ideal world the phone's software should be pay-to-upgrade but free-to-stay-as-is.
rpigab 3y ago
When I feel that I have to upgrade because the phone slows down or that newer apps aren't available on my OS version anymore, I move over to the opposing team so as to avoid incentivizing short-lived phones too much. So far, I only owned 2 phones in my life (didn't need one before the smartphone era), an iPhone 4S and a Google Pixel 3. For now, the Pixel 3 is doing great, battery life is not so good but holds the day.
aceazzameen 3y ago
And half the time the UX somewhere gets worse. Then a year or two later it gets better again. Then worse again. It's a stupid endless cycle that was solved years ago for devices that have only one main form of input. At this point I believe most UX changes are made solely for marketing's sake.
brookst 3y ago
Continuous improvement is the bedrock of pretty much everything modern. It’s a lot easier to make frequent minor revs than it is to do rare, gigantic revs. If you work in software, think of it as normal SDLC versus once-a-decade waterfall style total respec and rebuild. Which is more efficient? It also spreads demand more consistently, rather than having 90% of demand landing in the first year and 10% spread over the next four. What would that mean for production capacity? Continuous processes beat batch processes every time. See also: Tesla’s ideas about model years.
rdl 3y ago
New cars come out every year, with minor updates, and big updates every 3-10 years ("generation"). I am still pretty happy driving a 2006 car. Maybe phones move toward that, but I like incremental improvement, and I'd be annoyed to buy a phone today which is 4-5 years old if I'm also wanting to keep it for 3-5 years. Enterprise computers get refreshed every 3-6 years, usually (I'd probably do shorter for most laptops, longer for desktops). Monitors can do 5-10 years. Until they became active electronics, headphones/speakers/microphones which were decades old were fine. Biggest boost on a lot of new mobile device refresh is getting a new 0-cycle battery and a clean OS install, and for a lot of people, "buy a new one" is the main opportunity for that kind of upgrade.
janandonly 3y ago
Nobody is stopping you from only buying a new phone once every 5 years. Many (without much conscious thought maybe even) are doing this too. Simply replace when needed. That’s all there is to it.
kashyapc 3y ago
Isn't it the same story with every other "smart" device these days? Headphones, smart watches, etc? A new release almost every couple of years, causing a deluge of waste. That's our "growth at all costs" society.

karolist 3y ago

Not everyone lives on the same upgrade cycle, you can, but you're not supposed to change your phone every year. With iPhone 15, the majority of people upgrading would be 12 and older device owners.

kimbernator 3y ago
That is technically true. However, I do find that a lot of people I know tend to get new phones well before they actually have a need for them. I don't entirely blame peoples' consumerism; As somebody who once worked in cell phone sales, the mere act of visiting a carrier store is likely to land you in front of a salesperson who is incentivized to sell new phones and lines indiscriminately. Not to mention the incredible amount of advertising that goes into phones - if people only upgraded when they needed new phones, I don't think Apple, Samsung, or Google would feel the need to advertise the new ones so aggressively. HN is likely a much more tech-literate crowd than the average person, so I think to a lot of us it seems silly to buy new phones every year. But I know that every time Apple releases a new iPhone, I get a call from my dad asking if it's worth upgrading from last year's model. I say no, nothing has changed, but the next time I see him he has it. Why? Because the salesperson made such a convincing case, not only about the merit of the new phone, but the fact that they could give him such a "deal" on it.
- kaba0 3y ago
  > lot of people I know tend to get new phones well before they actually have a need for them It might just be your “bubble”, but even if not, is it really that bad of a deal? If you resell your previous phone at 2/3 the original price each year, you can use the latest phone for like 200 bucks for a year, or $17 monthly. For a device that is with you 0-24, and is probably the most often used item a typical person owns — they have it on them more often than even their shoes!
  - Krasnol 3y ago
    Yeah, but in the end they are those who fuel the waste machine. They start it, and they are the reason why there are new phones every year. For no sane reason. Somewhere along the way, you pass a threshold where it's uncool to have a certain version of phone and judging from what you hear about the waste problem with phones, it's above the reasonable moment to get rid of it because it's broken or not usable. I mean, sure it's a nice lie you can tell to yourself, but in the end, it's not good.
    - TeMPOraL 3y ago
      It's not always about being uncool. Sometimes it's about your current device getting slow enough to be annoying, so you want to replace to avoid paying the daily mental tax, "death through thousand papercuts", coming from the single piece of electronics you use most of, day in, day out. And that is caused mostly by software bloat - as mentioned elsewhere in the thread, between OS updates and app updates, a year is about how long a flagship phone has before it starts to become annoying to use. And then it only gets worse.
  - kimbernator 3y ago
    I feel qualified to say it's not just my bubble, having worked in cell phone sales. The business hinges on the fact that people don't run out the useful life of their devices. Incentives exist on the part of the person who, being human, definitely want the new shiny thing, regardless of the logic behind it. They exist for the salesperson, who will get a commission for selling the new shiny thing, regardless of whether this makes the customer's life any better or worse. They exist for the carrier because the customer is on the hook for 2-3 years of service when they buy the shiny thing. Finally, they exist for the company that made the phone because they make a profit on the sale price of the shiny thing.
ezequiel-garzon 3y ago
Indeed, Apple compares on its website the iPhone 15 to the iPhone 12: "The A16 Bionic GPU is up to 40% faster than the GPU in iPhone 12" [1]. Maybe unsurprisingly, they don't use this comparison for the Pro line. r/iphone discussion here [2]. [1] https://www.apple.com/mt/iphone-15/ https://www.apple.com/mt/iphone-15/ [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/16h13z3/why_are_they_comparing_a16_with_a14/ https://www.reddit.com/r/iphone/comments/16h13z3/why_are_the...
- agrippanux 3y ago
  That's an awesome stat in favor of the iPhone 12, which is now 3+ years old.
awill 3y ago
I agree. I find upgrading less frequently makes the upgrade so much more significant. Upgrading yearly would leave you complaining and wondering what's new. I know people who lease a new car every 3 years. And often, if there's no redesign, they're getting a nearly identical vehicle. It's strange. Whereas, I upgrade my car every 10 years, and am thrilled with all the improvements.
- kimbernator 3y ago
  This is fine and good, but the problem is that once your phone is no longer the newest thing, the experience takes a hit because there's little incentive to actually support your device anymore.
- pfannkuchen 3y ago
  I think the lease thing is more to avoid dealing with any maintenance issues as well as the wear and tear on a less than new car. It’s not to get the newest tech or style all the time AFAIK.
  - epolanski 3y ago
    Avoiding repairs, even if some of them might be expensive, is still insanely cheaper than leasing a new car every 3 days. People lease for many factors, not just to avoid tear and maintenance.
    - TeMPOraL 3y ago
      > still insanely cheaper than leasing a new car every 3 days Somehow that works for clothing vendors, though.
    - pfannkuchen 3y ago
      I don’t understand what you mean by avoiding repairs being cheaper. In order to avoid repairs you need to have a relatively new car all the time, and leasing is an easy way to achieve that. What other reasons do people lease?
Gigachad 3y ago
Apple has a few products like the ipad mini and imac that don't release on yearly schedules and it creates this situation where there are good and bad years to buy. Where the product hasn't been refreshed for 3/4 years and is now severely outdated and a major refresh is something like 6 months away. It's pretty bad for the customer and the seller. Meanwhile it's always a good time to buy an iphone. There is no point waiting for the next model because it won't be meaningfully different.

TaylorAlexander 3y ago

It's funny because if they did not release a new phone every year, the old phones would be useful for longer. I recently had to replace my iPhone 7s plus because it was getting so slow I sometimes could not get the camera to open as it loaded the system down too much. This was despite the fact that the system said my battery was not degraded (it had been replaced with Apple Care a couple of times). Of course when it was new the camera opened quickly. And then Apple made their OS more heavy weight every year until my phone slowed to a crawl. And faster phones are nice, but I think it is worth considering how valuable that really is to us as users and a society, especially if the process involves making loads and loads of ewaste and consuming tons of new resources, and all the emissions their mining and transport involves, when we could simply keep our software slim and our old devices functional. And the big companies will never do this. Do we need to force them to allow open software to run on these devices, so that clean builds can be patched and maintained when the company over bloats them or abandons them?

sanswork 3y ago
I don't update my phone every year but I also don't really want the progress of software or tech in general determined by the laggards.
- kimbernator 3y ago
  I think that a new phone release should just be warranted. The trigger should be "we made significant improvements that couldn't be applied in software to the old device" instead of "it's October"
  - sanswork 3y ago
    An improved camera can't be something applied in software, a faster chip can't be applied in software. So by your own standard every version is warranted.
    - kimbernator 3y ago

Eumenes 3y ago

> It's starting to feel silly, having a yearly release cycle for smartphones. These companies virtue signal about climate change nonstop, but still manage to produce disposable phones and light up their data centers for advertising and user tracking

yccs27 3y ago

Yeah, it feels like smartphones are finally maturing, and they are no longer new enough to justify the fast release cycles and short support times.

matsemann 3y ago
I feel it's a decade since I was excited about a new phone. Now I just copy over my settings and app, and act a bit disgruntled for a week that things are slightly different.
- CydeWeys 3y ago
  I have a Pixel 7 Pro that I was pretty excited to get, mainly for the 5X optical zoom lens. First time I've had anything like that on a phone. Super nice!
Gigachad 3y ago
Cars still release on a yearly schedule decades later and they change almost nothing each year.
- 0x457 3y ago
  Well no. Car models have generations and mid-generation updates (aka facelift). It's very rare that there are any updates at all within the same generation. Year in model designation is just "ha, look at his looser driving last year BMW" and to show when car left assembly line. There are some examples where the same generation had a significant upgrade without a facelift, but those are rare. One example I could think of is MX-5 (ND): between 2015 and 2018 there were no changes at all, but in late 2019 there was nearly complete overhaul of its powertrain and then a small update in 2021.
  - calvinmorrison 3y ago
    There's almost always year over year changes on the same chassis.

mdgrech23 3y ago

man if you think that's bad let me introduce you to the automobile industry.

iancmceachern 3y ago
Fashion too

taway1237 3y ago

I'm currently using Pixel 4a (just recently EOL), and I'll probably upgrade my phone this or next year. Maybe Pixel has a yearly release cycle, but it doesn't mean I have to upgrade every year, that would be crazy. And they can iterate more often to try some ideas more often than once every 5 years.

jaza 3y ago
I'm using a Pixel 3 (my first Pixel) that I bought new (in original sealed box) on eBay one year ago, for a bit under AUD$300, still works fine, all the apps keep upgrading (the OS won't upgrade as it's EOL, hasn't been an issue for me so far), the camera AI is impressive enough for me, I'm planning to keep on using it for at least another year. That's as close as I get to having a bleeding edge smartphone. No need to waste $1k+ on the latest and greatest hyped-up kool-aid.
- sibit 3y ago
  The Pixel 3 is a good phone. I bought one new and used it for ~5 years. The battery was still going strong and my only issue was the USB-C port stopped working.
  - m-p-e 3y ago
    For my Pixel it always helped to clean the USB-C port with a toothpick. That thing attracted so much lint from pocket like no other.

mrinterweb 3y ago

Obviously, companies that sell phones want to sell more phones as frequently as possible. I'm just glad that Google is aware that people value having longer term feature and security support for their products. The new 7 years of feature and security support is pretty fantastic.

0xDEF 3y ago

Nobody is demanding that you buy a new smartphone every year. Modern smartphones have 3-5 years of security/bug updates and the batteries no longer degrade as fast as they used to.

kimbernator 3y ago
I bought my pixel 7 early this year because my s20's screen broke and the cost to buy a new one to replace it myself, which is not something I think most people would be willing to do (instead paying even more for someone else to do it), exceeded the cost to buy another S20. On top of that, the moment my 3 year old, perfectly working phone had anything other than a pristine screen, it had zero trade-in value and basically encouraged me to throw it in a drawer or the trash. This was literally Samsung's flagship phone only 3 years prior. That could have probably been mitigated if the s20 remained relevant for more than a year or two and there was a mature parts market that made it feasible to upkeep rather than scrap.
tootie 3y ago
Yeah, I think I'm going to pull the trigger on a Pixel 8 and that's partly because I've been rocking a Pixel 4a for several years.

freedomben 3y ago

Normally I agree with you, but I don't think that's the case this year at least. The on-device ML chip (Tensor G3) is a legit difference-maker. A lot of the ML features they are rolling out wouldn't be possible on older hardware. You could do the non-realtime portions in the cloud, but the realtime audio cleanup wouldn't work for example (way too much latency). Also, personally I much prefer on-device. I frequently have spotty data connections so it's very disruptive when stuff relies on cloud connectivity.

criddell 3y ago
When I upgrade in two or three years from now, the ML chip will probably be even better than now. My phone has been fine for the past couple of years and the introduction of something on iPhone 15 doesn’t really change that. I don’t mind waiting.

paxys 3y ago

What's silly isn't the fact that they release new smartphones every year but that people feel compelled to upgrade every year. Incremental annual hardware refreshes are great, because everyone who is in the market for a phone can always get the latest and greatest and can be set for several years. For those that give in to the marketing and throw away perfectly usable devices and a thousand+ dollars – well that's nobody's fault but their own.

utopcell 3y ago

Five years ? Why would someone want to experience hardware advances in large steps instead of continuously ?

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
kimbernator 3y ago
Based on the phrasing of this, I'm not sure if it's meant to be taken sarcastically or not. Apologies if you did mean it that way, because I'll respond seriously: - Advances are mostly software. - Massive quantities of e-waste (and plastic waste via cases, screen protectors, etc). - Perverse incentives by companies to not properly support the user experience on older devices. - Tons of money spent pointlessly.
iancmceachern 3y ago
I live this way now. My android phone is more than 5 years old, the tech in my laptop is similar. I'm doing just fine and don't feel like I'm missing out on anything. I run up to date advanced software just like the whole world

matsemann 3y ago

In the iPhone 15 release they wrote "huge leap" 6 times. It felt like something to anchor the perception and to trick journalists to include it in a sentence. But when they say it so much, it kinda shines through that it's mostly just desperate words. "any man who must say I'm the king is no true king" vibes. https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2023/09/apple-debuts-iphone-15-and-iphone-15-plus/ https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2023/09/apple-debuts-iphone-1...

theodric 3y ago
It's always the greatest iPhone ever! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPkso_6n0vs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPkso_6n0vs
- crossroadsguy 3y ago
  The highest number in Apple version history ever! Wait for it …… after last highest 15, we have … ……… 15.0001. Yes!
animex 3y ago
The fact that's it's just 15 seems to belie this. I would expect Apple to re-brand once something truly different comes along... that being said all smartphones are becoming long and in the tooth and we're finally starting to see inklings of what might replace our phone addiction in the near-term (audio (buds) + vision, eyeglasses etc.)

dottjt 3y ago

Isn't domain knowledge lost when we don't regularly build and release things? Isn't this why we're struggling to build nuclear in some countries because they weren't building it regularly, and now it's difficult to scale, let alone build new ones? I understand that it's wasteful, but maybe it's necessary to sustain itself? Especially from a feedback perspective from consumers?

TeMPOraL 3y ago
> I understand that it's wasteful, but maybe it's necessary to sustain itself? Some waste is the cost of resiliency. But with phones (and other electronics and appliances), we're talking about extreme amounts of waste. Way more than is needed to keep around and develop the capacity and know-how. > Especially from a feedback perspective from consumers? What feedback? Unless they screw things really badly, they're just listening to the echoes of their own marketing departments. This is a supply-driven market with high natural barriers to entry. Customers buy what they're told to, and are happy about it as they're told to.

sawyna 3y ago

My pixel 4a 5g works like a charm. 3.5 years and still going fine. I used my pixel 2 for three years so badly. I used it as a hotspot every single day and the number of battery cycles were as if the phone was used for 6 years. My pixel 4a5g takes photos that are on reasonable standards, obviously they won't match match, but it doesn't make a serious difference either to me. I need three things from my phone - battery, camera and lag free user experience. I don't need thinner bezels for gods sake, I can't understand the craze and demand for thinner bezels over a two day battery life.

theodric 3y ago
Whatever you do, don't take the Android 14 upgrade. Mine is dogshit slow now. I'm trying to decide if I can be bothered losing all my config and setting it up again with Android 13, or just paying Google for a new phone.
- _ea1k 3y ago
  It may just need a little while to settle down. I get the feeling a lot of things get updated in the background after the initial upgrade. I noticed that my old Pixel 5 felt really slow for the first 30 minutes or so, but it seems to be returning to normal now.
sadnessmalaysia 3y ago
DON'T UPGRADE TO ANDROID 14, I am 4a 5G user, work as charm on last version of Android 13 September version, I feel like a lot of dropping frame while using Android 14. I feel upset and dissapointed towards Google now.

theodric 3y ago

Unfortunately the world is filled with people like my fried who, without fail, buys - for cash, not as part of a contract renewal - the max spec iPhone available every year. One for him, one for his wife. Sell the old ones, or give them to family. Revenue like that is too hard for these companies to pass up. And so we get this waste.

envsubst 3y ago
> And so we get this waste. Wait. If they are making phones that get bought up every year because of people like your friend, then where is the waste?
- phito 3y ago
  In the landfill
  - envsubst 3y ago
    Do you have any information about how much material going to landfills? What if 1 car is 1000 phones?

chaostheory 3y ago

The status quo is great. You have yearly releases that are stable and allow anyone to upgrade without fear of the new model coming out like with traditional video game consoles. No one is forcing you to buy anything you don’t want. Also, the OS and apps need to take advantage of new hardware, so it’s not a surprise if your seven year old phone becomes slower. If you don’t like the status quo then I would go with a non-iOS and non-android phone like pine phone, Mairena, librem, or anything else that based on a more open Linux distro.

kimbernator 3y ago
I think it's interesting that you cite video game consoles as a negative. I'd argue the opposite, I think phones should be more like them. With video game consoles, you have a single device where micro-optimizations are constantly done, new features are added, and all software can be purpose-built to work really well on that specific hardware. All of that for ~7 years means a really fantastic user experience and a massive community of people that have collectively worked through solutions to common problems and forced the company's hand on defects (joycon drift, for example). It also means tons of high-quality hardware-specific accessories, both from the company that made the console and from third parties.
- bravetraveler 3y ago
  I don't see why it couldn't be that way - I see people overstating the hardware revisions. Apple, sure, they innovate. Qualcomm? Hah. For about five years it seemed like every flagship spanning generations was the same SoC
  - fomine3 3y ago
    Meanwhile Apple always do the best (and their older chip like A14 is already enough in today IMO), Qualcomm often hits and miss. Their flagship chip made by Samsung fab is tend to be bad battery life and heat. SD888 to 8 Gen2 upgrade is huge than expected for me.
hyperhopper 3y ago

AuthorizedCust 3y ago

Your premise is wrong. Old phones that have economic life get cleaned up and re-sold. The fact that manufacturers tweak phones annually does not change this.

rurp 3y ago
Based on the numbers I found from a few minutes of searching you are incorrect. Some phones get resold or reused, most do not. Only 25% of people are using a secondhand phone and the phone population is increasing at 5x the human rate.

chiefalchemist 3y ago

The Apple adverts push the fact that the 15 is titanium. That's it. The ad I keep seeing doesn't even hint at why Titanium matters. No matter, the point is, evidently the technical aspects don't seem to matter.

fomine3 3y ago
Titanium matters for lightweight that is one of the important spec for some people. They aren't good at advertising this (or don't want to advertise much to make heavier again in the future?)
- chiefalchemist 3y ago
  But they don't even say that. As if everyone knows that? And no technical improvements? But then again, the new USB C with out of date max data throughput is nothing to brag about.
- dheera 3y ago
  You wouldn't notice it, the difference in weight between aluminum and titanium phone shell is negligible compared to the weight of the glass, battery, and PCBs combined. Titanium sounds cool, it sounds luxury, it's a marketing hack. Like <strike>"aircraft-grade"</strike> "space-grade" aluminum. Nobody is launching their aluminum phones at escape velocity. It's 100% for marketing reasons. I have some titanium spoons, I feel into the trap too.
  - wilsonnb3 3y ago
    > You wouldn't notice it, the difference in weight between aluminum and titanium phone shell is negligible compared to the weight of the glass, battery, and PCBs combined. The previous iPhone Pro's have a stainless steel shell, not aluminum, and the ~30 gram difference is noticeable. Of course, they caused this problem themselves by using stainless steel rather than aluminum like the regular iPhones, but they are nonetheless solving a problem with the titanium frame.

triceratops 3y ago

You may not buy a new phone every year. But there's always someone who's buying a new phone right now. Why should they have to buy hardware that's potentially almost 5 years old?

prmoustache 3y ago
It doesn't seem to annoy people who buy cars. In fact usually cars that were released 5 years before had most of their quirks known and ironed out through a midlife revamp or the model or scheduled preventive replacement of known parts breaking at a specific mileage. Just released one tend to be more of a problem to first gen owners reliability wise. I rely on my smartphone for work, I'd rather buy a 4y old model known to be reliable than a brand knew one that ends up preventing me to call 911 or whose screen die randomly and unexpectedly.
- rezonant 3y ago
  To be fair, a car is widely expected to last 12 years or longer, has relatively simple software and computer systems, and has no (or limited) access to your personal data. They are also typically a much larger investment. The phone on the other hand is connected to every facet of your life and has a software stack that absolutely contains security flaws waiting to be found and exploited. Apple has always worked to keep devices secure longer, at least up until now having the best long term support. My favorite part of the Pixel 8 is that Google is attempting to match and exceed what Apple's done so far. Phone performance and features are definitely not changing fast enough for older devices to no longer be useful, even for affluent audiences. I hope support windows continue to get longer so that folks who must use or choose to use older devices can remain secure.
  - prmoustache 3y ago
    > The phone on the other hand is connected to every facet of your life and has a software stack that absolutely contains security flaws waiting to be found and exploited. This is an entirely different subject. The software can be upgraded/updated during the life of the mobile phone. And when it comes to chip makers mistakes, which led to vulns like Spectres, they are likely to affect several generations of chips anyway.

oaktowner 3y ago

I agree with much of this post, but I have to take issue with "it's starting to feel silly." The "you need to upgrade your phone every year" concept has been silly from the outset.

kimbernator 3y ago
That's totally a fair point, but at least phones were actually adding new features year to year a decade ago. It's fair to have new stuff releasing yearly when you're in the "throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" phase.

dominojab 3y ago

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maxerickson 3y ago

They are selling millions of each version. There's lots of products where the volume is more like 10,000. The waste isn't in the product that is selling millions...

brokencode 3y ago

A lot of these new software features are enabled by better hardware. Especially AI features, which can require quite specialized and powerful processors. On-device LLMs are the next frontier in personal assistant software, and that can only be enabled by better hardware. Even the image processing for high resolution images can benefit from better hardware. Modern smartphones are heavily dependent on image processing to improve camera quality. Without the right hardware, performance and energy efficiency could be unacceptable.

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bradgessler 3y ago

Try this: don’t upgrade your phone for five years. The annual incremental release cycle is fine—what’s silly is thinking phones need to be upgraded every year.

TeMPOraL 3y ago
> Try this: don’t upgrade your phone for five years. Try that and monitor your quality of life. See if you can avoid therapy. It's not that people think they need to upgrade their phones every year, or two, or three. It's that the phones are designed for short usable life on hardware side, and on software side, neither first-party nor third-party developers give a damn about performance.
- bradgessler 3y ago
  I upgrade once every 2-3 years on average and my quality of life is great. It’s not on principle either—I will walk into an Apple Store with my existing phone and use it side-by-side with whatever is their latest. If think the new thing improves my life I’ll buy it. Currently I’m using an iPhone 12 Pro Max. Last year when I compared its “lesser camera” to the latest and greatest, I couldn’t tell much of a difference so I kept the old phone. The specs they throw out are always better on paper, but practice upgrading each year will yield very little improvement in quality of life.
- xyzelement 3y ago
  What is the evidence of this claim? My wife just got to a place where her iPhone got unusable because it's running out of space - mainly having to do with her massive Messages history and photos/videos. We didn't even know until I checked, her phone is the iPhone X which was released 6 years ago and technically nothing is stopping her from using it longer except the lack of desire to prune her message history/photos/vids. My wife is someone who's not going to suffer with a poorly functioning piece of technology nor someone who is going to work hard to optimize it or prolong its life, so the fact that her 6 year old phone works just fine is a good sign that it can, in the average case.
  - 3y ago

mtreis86 3y ago

It makes sense for gaming consoles, I don't see what is so different (these days) about phones.

TylerE 3y ago
Game consoles don’t have all the peripherals including the screen soldered directly on.

muxxa 3y ago

Try out https://shop.fairphone.com/fairphone-5 https://shop.fairphone.com/fairphone-5 for a repair/upgrade friendly alternative

crossroadsguy 3y ago
It’s still a “fancy” or too niche a phone. It neither has the reach, nor the supply chain backbone. By the time it reaches critical operational/business mass phone landscape would have had changed. Just like it’ll happen with frame.work.
- berkes 3y ago
  You'll really need to come with some backup of your claims. Because it simply isn't true. FP has been around for 10 years now, making phones, learning, scaling up. They sold close to a million phones every year since 2020 (last year over 1100000 phones). And while a million phones isn't much compared to iPhones or Pixels, it's bigger than many other small phone companies (Chinese or not). They've been diversifying with headphones, and earbuds. And with t he last edition, they finally felt confident with supply chains to guarantee spare parts for decades to come.

madeofpalk 3y ago

This seems divorced from reality. Just because a new phone is released every year, it doesn't mean you need to buy a new one every year. Small, incremental improvements each year means that whenever you buy a new device, it's modern (not using 4 year old components), and substantially 'better' than the previous one.

quicklime 3y ago

If I’m buying a phone 4 years into the cycle, I don’t want to start with a 4-year-old CPU and camera. 5 years later, when I’m ready to get a new phone, that’ll be a 9-year-old CPU and camera. I’d rather have the latest tech when I buy it, and use it until it stops working. I agree though that the physical design should stay the same, so that cases and accessories don’t need to be thrown away. Apple more-or-less does this with the iPhones, eg a case should work with any iPhone 12-14.

tootie 3y ago

Tell it to the car industry. They invented it and it's been going strong.

rrrrrrrrrrrryan 3y ago
Both car and phone trade ins get resold and used until their actual EOL, no? I imagine most of these Pixel 8s that physically survive to year 7 (no cracked screen, etc) will have been traded in and will continue to be used in the 3rd world.

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tshaddox 3y ago

I think it's more likely that if they spaced the releases out to every 5 years, there would just be a 5x reduction in the pace of changes, and you could issue the same complaint "Why do they release every 5 years when hardly anything changes?" It's not like the incremental physical changes just automatically happen independently of designing, mass manufacturing, and releasing new phone models. The incremental physical changes happen because companies are trying to develop new phone models.

roland35 3y ago

I remember how much I wanted every new phone before - back in the days of my Motorola Droid there was always some awesome new feature or development. Now, the only reason I upgrade is if the phone ends up damaged or unusable.

rcarr 3y ago

I think the market agrees with you as well. The going rate for a 512GB Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra in like new condition is somewhere in the £600-£700 region. The equivalent S23 Ultra, with only minor specification differences as far as I can see, is currently retailing at £1399. That's a gigantic depreciation for a phone that's only a year and a half old. Phones used to depreciate much slower 5 - 10 years ago.

megraf 3y ago

I've started thinking about cars like this too. We shouldn't have yearly models, it's an absolute waste

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dmead 3y ago

no no, you should just separate your papers and plastics and keep buying the pocket super computer every year.

aembleton 3y ago
Do you also buy a new car when a model update comes out? Do you a new laptop every time a new one gets released? You don't have to get the latest phone all of the time.

mancerayder 3y ago

>functions that may have some vague relationship with the slightly upgraded hardware But never scaling up the damned battery above and sometimes even at demand. It's ultimately my number one request, and I'm sure that of many others.

losvedir 3y ago

I think counterintuitively there's less waste this way. With yearly, incremental releases, people will evaluate what's new from their phone and most people will update on their own cycle, probably every few or several years. Meanwhile, with gaming console "generational" releases every few years, that is a strong incentive for everyone to upgrade. If I have a 3 year old phone which I'm on the fence about updating, then I might pass on this year's model and go for next year's. But if there won't be another phone for 3 more years I guess I might as well get this one.

manicennui 3y ago
A lot of people are on 2-year payment plans through their provider and just switch every time.
- eru 3y ago
  Yes, but those plans cost extra compared to one that doesn't have this feature. (And don't many plans come with some sort of discount, if you don't upgrade your phone?)
  - sudosysgen 3y ago
    Not in every country/region, unfortunately. In my case it's cheaper to upgrade my phone and sell my previous phone than get a BYOB device by a significant margin.
    - eru 3y ago
      Yes. Though in terms of physical waste that the original commenter brought up, selling your old phone for someone else to use makes that upgrade a pretty good option. We could look at the total amount of years any phone is used and abstract away from who uses it. Slightly stylised, if we have four people, Alice, Bob, Charles and Dave, and Alice gets a new phone every year, Bob buys Alice's old phone, Charles buys Bob's old phone, and Dave gets Charles' old phone, then everyone changes phones every year, but each phone is still used for a full four years.

macintux 3y ago

Apple has, what, roughly 1 billion iPhone users right now. Imagine if they only released a new design every 5 years. They'd have to manufacture another billion iPhones in a relatively short window of time to handle all of the upgrades.

heroiccocoa 3y ago

But phones are manufactured regardless, so why not let the people who are currently in the market for a new device get something current? The yearly release cycle isn't meant to be kept up with every year, in fact I think that that notion is so hilariously out of touch basically everywhere except the US (and a small international wealthy elite elsewhere) that it would be ridiculed. Remember, the global median per-capita household income is only $2,920 per year. That's not "the poor", that's the median. 99% of the world would never have even considered buying an iPhone 15 or similar after having an iPhone 14, let alone feel pressured to do so.

stickfigure 3y ago
I've been consistently upgrading every 3 years since the Nexus days and I really don't think I'm missing anything. With trade-in, it ends up being something like $50/yr (I always go for the budget versions). Unless you're already sitting on FU money, I don't understand why anyone would spend more.
- ccooffee 3y ago
  > Unless you're already sitting on FU money, I don't understand why anyone would spend more [than $50/yr on phone upgrades]. Among the people I know, there's more people living paycheck to paycheck and getting annual phone upgrades than people with FU money doing upgrades. That said, the percentage of FU money upgraders is higher than the percentage of paycheck-to-paycheck upgraders. Google/Samsung/Apple/etc may be making more total money from the not-well-off than the well-off, at least thinking about people I know.
  - tyre 3y ago
    There's a point at which something like a new smartphone isn't a status symbol anymore. Among wealthier people, having an iPhone 11 isn't less of a signal than a day one iPhone 15.
    - deleted 3y ago
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syndacks 3y ago

It’s almost as if these companies have a strategy to grow their business.

8jef 3y ago

As someone who's mostly buying used tech, or newish at deep discounted price from classifieds or ebay, I appreciate not having to wait 5 years cycles for stuff. Yearly release cycles means people let go sooner of perfectly functioning high end tech very fast, selling for very cheap, and I'm very grateful for that. Great many containers filled with stuff from rich countries find their way to poor countries, some include stolen goods (like cars), others include garbage, most include goods that still have some value for other people, including tech. Maybe the problem should be looked at from that angle, and maybe there's no problem, really. One's garbage will always be another one's treasure.

interpenetrate 3y ago
[flagged]

envsubst 3y ago

The price system is how our society allocates resources. The fact that people are allocating their own resources to buy one -- without any perverse incentives or being compelled, indicates it's not wasteful to them. A better example of waste is when local governments funds things which people don't use. I think the root of this sentiment is misunderstanding or lack of satisfaction at the system level.

scarface_74 3y ago

How is it “physical waste”? No one is forcing you to buy a new phone and in the case of iPhones, Apple has released security updates in the past year for all iPhones introduced in the last decade. I have an iPhone 12 Pro Max that is three generations behind now. While there is nothing I have to have, the always on display, the USB 3 speed, and video out to my portable USB-C monitor on the iPhone 15 Pro would be nice.

4m1rk 3y ago

> as opposed to meaningful improvement upon the existing design or introduction of a new hardware feature I just wish they kept the pixel 4 design and only improved the battery life. I would pay more for it than this new design.

ako 3y ago

This has nothing to do with phones, but products in general. Many product companies try to release new product versions very year. Not because they expect customers to update every year, but because buyers looking for a new product want to buy the newest to ensure the product is not outdated soon. And the older version can be sold to price sensitive customers, so it allows product companies to get higher margins for new products.

wg0 3y ago

And - price is ridiculously high. $1000+ for what? I don't know about others but my phone camera is only used for scanning QR codes rarely or taking occasional pictures of family (not a picture every hour) which even lower range phones (300 USD or so) do damn decent given it's not dark. My 98% of the usage is to read something. Some website, email or ebook. Why do I need 120 Hz display for that? Gaming? That's always going to be inferior to even a console let alone a gaming PC.

mda 3y ago
Many people takes thousands of pictures / videos with their phones yearly.

em3rgent0rdr 3y ago

Landline phones, for comparison, were bought once and lasted ~30 years.

someonehere 3y ago

I agree. I was convinced I need to move from an iPhone 14 to iPhone 15. My reasoning was better camera. I honestly was going to skip upgrading but the camera and some other minor features were enough for me to make the upgrade happen. I feel if these companies worked together to cut back on the waste of yearly release cycles, there’d be better environmental results. But every year we have a new feature because tech has caught up with demand. Not sure what the middle ground is.

Freak_NL 3y ago
What is stopping you from just using your old phone until it actually needs replacing? I have a Pixel 6 which takes excellent photos. In two years time, it will still take excellent photos, regardless of what the Pixel 8 or 9 or 10 does.
light_hue_1 3y ago
They keep selling a better camera. Constantly. Every year. Yet, can you really look at your old photos and say "my God, those 2017 photos. Could you imagine taking such crappy photos with such a bad phone?" I doubt it. That hasn't been true in more than a decade even for challenging environments like in low light. They're selling you on a better camera each year because there's basically no useful way to measure its impact anymore aside from in really technical conditions that don't affect anyone practically.
- jerojero 3y ago
  Well, when they added a wide lens camera to phones I think that significantly changed phone photography. In the Pixel 7 pro (and the 8 pro) they added a telephoto lens; this is another significant upgrade. Personally, I have a proper camera, but I am not carrying it around with me at all times. My phone takes excellent pictures (I have a pixel 6) but I do feel the lack of zoom. The quality of the main cameras hasn't really gone up in a few generations; but I do think there's been significant improvements in the photography department in phones in the last 5 years. Wide lens, macro photography, zoom lenses. These are genuine innovations. It does make me a bit angry when software is kept locked into new models when older models are perfectly capable of running it though. But there's been hardware innovation for sure. Don't really see much of a reason to go from a Pixel 7 pro to a Pixel 8 pro, and probably not going to be the case for a few years. But who knows.

kwanbix 3y ago

I was thinking the same the other day, and cannot agree more. A bi-annual release cycle should cut waste in half. Companies keep polluting the world, as if we had another alternative to live on.

pjmlp 3y ago

For my point of view they can release as often as they wish, I will only replace my phones when they die or get stolen.

rsynnott 3y ago

> Think not only of people upgrading for the sake of it This is actually a very small part of the market. Virtually no-one upgrades their phone every year. 3-4 years is more typical.

rkagerer 3y ago

Yeah. They couldn't even give us an ultrasonic fingerprint reader, which is one feature that would have convinced me to buy this instead of the 7. The brighter screen and 1TB model are the only upgrades I find compelling.

addicted 3y ago

An annual release cycle isn’t for people who bought the phone last year. It’s for people who bought their phones 2 or 3 years (or even more) ago. The question is how does this phone compare to the Pixel Pro 6 or 5, not how it compares the 7.

raincole 3y ago

> Every new iPhone, Pixel, or Samsung phone basically claims the camera is marginally better and hey, look at these software features that have very little to do with the hardware and should not fundamentally be a reason to upgrade to this phone. But the software development is driven by the profit from hardware sales. Why would they improve the software if it doesn't make money? I guess in the ideal world the phone's software should be pay-to-upgrade but free-to-stay-as-is.

rpigab 3y ago

When I feel that I have to upgrade because the phone slows down or that newer apps aren't available on my OS version anymore, I move over to the opposing team so as to avoid incentivizing short-lived phones too much. So far, I only owned 2 phones in my life (didn't need one before the smartphone era), an iPhone 4S and a Google Pixel 3. For now, the Pixel 3 is doing great, battery life is not so good but holds the day.

aceazzameen 3y ago

And half the time the UX somewhere gets worse. Then a year or two later it gets better again. Then worse again. It's a stupid endless cycle that was solved years ago for devices that have only one main form of input. At this point I believe most UX changes are made solely for marketing's sake.

brookst 3y ago

Continuous improvement is the bedrock of pretty much everything modern. It’s a lot easier to make frequent minor revs than it is to do rare, gigantic revs. If you work in software, think of it as normal SDLC versus once-a-decade waterfall style total respec and rebuild. Which is more efficient? It also spreads demand more consistently, rather than having 90% of demand landing in the first year and 10% spread over the next four. What would that mean for production capacity? Continuous processes beat batch processes every time. See also: Tesla’s ideas about model years.

rdl 3y ago

New cars come out every year, with minor updates, and big updates every 3-10 years ("generation"). I am still pretty happy driving a 2006 car. Maybe phones move toward that, but I like incremental improvement, and I'd be annoyed to buy a phone today which is 4-5 years old if I'm also wanting to keep it for 3-5 years. Enterprise computers get refreshed every 3-6 years, usually (I'd probably do shorter for most laptops, longer for desktops). Monitors can do 5-10 years. Until they became active electronics, headphones/speakers/microphones which were decades old were fine. Biggest boost on a lot of new mobile device refresh is getting a new 0-cycle battery and a clean OS install, and for a lot of people, "buy a new one" is the main opportunity for that kind of upgrade.

janandonly 3y ago

Nobody is stopping you from only buying a new phone once every 5 years. Many (without much conscious thought maybe even) are doing this too. Simply replace when needed. That’s all there is to it.

kashyapc 3y ago

Isn't it the same story with every other "smart" device these days? Headphones, smart watches, etc? A new release almost every couple of years, causing a deluge of waste. That's our "growth at all costs" society.