Apple announced the results of its fiscal fourth quarter on Thursday. The company generated $102.5B, a Q4 record which also closed its biggest fiscal year in terms of revenue ever. The fast-growing Services category also set an all-time high. Mac and iPhone revenue were also up, with wearables and iPad revenue more or less flat.
Apple also provided guidance that it expects to break records in its holiday quarter, including in iPhone sales. Read more about that here.
Dan Moren and I also did a YouTube Stream discussing all these results in detail:
If there’s a company that’s not shy about experimenting with video possibilities on the Vision Pro, it’s Sandwich. Adam Lisagor and his crew have built two apps, Television and Theater, and have streamed John Gruber’s live Talk Show event in 3-D for the last two years.
On Thursday, they take another step forward with what could be argued as the world’s first immersive commercial. Sandwich and director Seth Worley made a conventional ad for Robot.com recently, but just before leaving for the shoot, Lisagor took ownership of a new Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive camera and couldn’t resist taking it with him.
We’ve passed through another new iPhone season, that glorious time of year when everyone gets a new phone. Right? If you read enough Apple news or hang out with enough tech podcasters, it would seem to be so.
But just as science fiction offers us the possibility of parallel universes, time spent talking to people who don’t even know when preorders open up each year is bound to alter the way you experience the most iPhone time of the year. And as someone who isn’t personally in the new-phone-a-year club, I’ve felt for a while that we enthusiast writers and talkers collectively overestimate, or over-sample, at any rate, those who are always up-to-date with their Apple gear.
But is it as black-and-white (er, midnight and starlight) as all that? Do Apple nerds always trade up from last year’s phone, determined to rock the best camera and the most dynamic of islands, while regular folks struggle on until the screen shatters and the charger port rattles?
In the public radio newsroom where I work, phones are mighty important. We track down sources who won’t return our emails. We text our favorite news analyzers at 7:30 a.m. to see if they’ll please talk to us for today’s 10 a.m. show. We ask those same guests if they have an iPhone for the segment taping, because FaceTime Audio calls sound best. But no one I spoke to between iPhone event day and order arrival day had preordered a new phone, or could even tell me what new things Apple had put on offer. (Well, someone asked about the “thin one,” but that was about it.)
On the other hand, I imagine a “typical” Six Colors reader soaking up Jason’s event recaps and studying the presentation video for clues about this year’s color choices. Next comes the trip to apple.com to get that Pro Max preordered, and sharing the happy news with a family member that last year’s super phone is coming their way. Finally, there’s a trip to the Apple Store to claim the phone, or impatient refreshing of the old phone’s browser to track that package from Apple.
Survey says!
To find out whether iPhone users live in vastly different worlds from one another, I decided to put together a survey of the non-enthusiast iPhone users in my life (“Civilians”). To my newsroom cohort, I added other staff from KUT and KUTX Radio in Austin, plus a smattering from my Facebook feed – social media home base for cousins, high school acquaintances, and people I worked with back before the iPod was Apple’s flagship handheld device.
When I brought the idea to Jason, he suggested giving the same survey to Six Colors members. Okay then. Instead of just proving my assumptions about iPhone civilians, we could find out how well they matched, or clashed, with the enthusiast readership.
I asked ten questions, all focused on how long people hold onto their phones, and what factors influence them when they think about getting a new one. I also wanted to know how people acquire their phones. I didn’t ask for demographic information. We sent the same survey to Six Colors members via Discord. Though the questions were identical, I collected results separately. My survey of civilians netted 49 responses, while 204 Six Colors members took the survey. There is nothing scientific about this survey, and the larger number of members in the pool does give a more granular look at the numbers than the civilian results do. Even so, I’m happy with the response from both audiences.
What model, how often?
So what iPhone does your average news reporter, DJ, or Shelly’s cousin carry around? I suspected this question would bring a wide array of responses, and I was right. My group listed 19 different iPhone models, and one selected “Other iPhone,” which means theirs is older than that. But if I thought new models were completely out of the realm for these folks, I was wrong: three have already picked up an iPhone 17 Pro Max.
Six Colors members, meanwhile, mentioned 20 different models, one more than my cohort did. But 43% have already picked up a 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max.
Members
Civilians
iPhone 12
0%
2%
iPhone 12 Pro
0%
2%
iPhone 12 Pro Max
0%
0%
iPhone 12 mini
1%
2%
iPhone 13
0%
9%
iPhone 13 Pro
1%
4%
iPhone 13 Pro Max
2%
2%
iPhone 13 mini
5%
2%
iPhone 14
0%
11%
iPhone 14 Plus
0%
2%
iPhone 14 Pro
3%
6%
iPhone 14 Pro Max
1%
0%
iPhone 15
1%
2%
iPhone 15 Plus
1%
2%
iPhone 15 Pro
6%
9%
iPhone 15 Pro Max
6%
6%
iPhone 16
4%
6%
iPhone 16 Pro
13%
11%
iPhone 16 Pro Max
6%
13%
iPhone 17
1%
0%
iPhone 17 Pro
26%
0%
iPhone 17 Pro Max
17%
6%
iPhone Air
3%
0%
Other
0%
2%
Central to my idea about regular people and their phones is a belief that getting a new one every year is a rarified thing. Fully 38% of respondents say their new phone purchases come four years or more apart. Another 22% answered that they get a new one when the old one dies. 20% are on a one- or two-year cycle. Among members, 35% upgrade every year, with another 28% on a two-year cycle. That’s a lot of frequent upgraders, but it still leaves 40% hanging onto their phones for three years or more.
A related, but slightly different question was about how long folks have had the phone they’re using right now. It’s always possible that upgrade cycles are irregular, especially if they’re dependent on how an old phone is holding up. Here I got my first surprise. 31% of civilians have had their current phone for less than one year. So, as I wrote last year, maybe the iPhone 16 cycle was a tempting upgrade opportunity. Another 29% say their current phone is 1-2 years old. Only 6% say they’ve had their current phone for more than four years.
The feature chart
It’s hard to pick just one thing about a new product that gets you to buy it. So I let respondents pick two features they value when choosing a phone. This doesn’t address what was going on with an old phone or how long it’s been since their last upgrade. But I wondered how the things reviewers write about, and that Apple sells in those iPhone event videos, map to the things buyers value. Well, camera won the day among both survey groups; 31% for Six Colors readers and 21% for the non-readers. 21% of non-readers (tied with camera) listed price, while only 4% of Six Colors readers picked it. Next on both lists was speed/performance/specs, with a slightly larger percentage (19%) of civilians choosing that option. Coming in next for both groups – screen size. Again, percentages were similar.
Aesthetics
If any questions in this survey can be traced directly to the tech podcasts I consume, it would be those about phone color and the case versus no-case lifestyle. Color and color choice matter a lot to some people, and not a great deal to others. I gave survey-takers a choice of nine colors. I didn’t ask about their current phone’s color, but which one they would choose if they could. I didn’t bother with Apple’s ever-eclectic color names, just some basics.
Of those with a preference, blue was the top choice among both groups, though it tied with red among civilians. Six Colors members’ second-favorite was orange, with black holding down third place. Only 6% of Six Colors members said they don’t care about phone color. 22% of non-members have no preference. Have they been convinced by Apple that color isn’t a thing they should care about?
I do regret not including silver or gold as options. Perhaps that’s why “something else” earned 10% of responses, tied with black and green, among civilians. Just 4% of Six Colors members wanted a choice I didn’t offer.
I asked about cases because I thought the result might say something about the importance of phone color, or lack thereof. 92% of regular folks said their iPhone rocks a case, so the hue of those edges peeking out does matter to some. No one in this group said they are sometimes case users. Six Colors readers are far more likely to go caseless, with 33% choosing that option, and another 9% indicating they sometimes use a case.
Dollars and cents
Yearly upgraders can choose the iPhone Upgrade Program, and buyers often receive incentives to get a phone over two years from cellular carriers. 41% of my civilian responders said they have used some kind of incentive to get a better deal. I’d guess that a lot of them are paying phones off through a carrier deal, based on the lack of once-a-year upgraders. I was surprised that only 25% of Six Colors members are using some sort of upgrade/incentive program, given generally shorter upgrade cycles.
Given the lifespan of most iPhones, I also wanted to know if people in my newsroom/Facebook cohort were beneficiaries of a passed-down phone from a family member or friend. Even in the non-enthusiast world, lots of people have that person in their life who turns a family member’s old tech into an excuse to upgrade for themselves, I believed. Just 16% said they were rocking a hand-me-down. But that’s still a significant number in terms of iPhone longevity overall. These devices are often good for multiple owners. Only one Six Colors member said they got their current phone in this way. (This doesn’t account for those who are the passers of phones, not the recipients.)
Summing up the survey
The fun part of reading these two sets of survey answers was how often the results swung far apart, and then came back together, and how many different iPhone ownership experiences are available. The lineup, as updated, expanded, and contracted over the years, is even more flexible than I had imagined. The sheer number of models and vintages still in service gives people a lot of options. Even if they might like to get something new, there’s a way to make the older phone work. And every once in a while, a big old splurge happens, when a camera, or a new color, or something intangible, puts that option in front of someone’s face.
There are a lot of Six Colors members who go all-in on what Apple has to offer. But another large group is less predictable, and just as likely as anyone to keep an iPhone for years.
We talk about how excited we are to get ads in Maps and Apple’s thinking on cozying up to Trump and then decide to do our own electrical work because why not?
For those building custom shortcuts, some actions have been updated:
“Calculate Expression” can now evaluate expressions that include units, including real time currency conversion rates, temperature, distance, and more
“Create QR Code” can now specify colors and styling
“Date” can now specify a holiday
“Find Contacts” can now filter by relationship
“Transcribe Audio” performance has been improved
“Show Content” can now display scrollable lists of items, like calendar events, reminders, and more
Nice to see improvements and even nicer to see them written down like this. I’d like to see even more Shortcuts documentation like this, because sometimes you don’t even know what you don’t know.
Stephen Hackett joins Jason to discuss modem quirks, new iPhone rumors, cutting-edge immersive video production, and the boring march of Apple silicon.
A friend of mine, Larry, asked for a little help with some various email and sync problems. On a Zoom call with him, I diagnosed it, helped him find the correct settings, and then we promptly deleted his email account and all his thousands of stored messages. (There’s a twist at the end.)
Apple makes Liquid Glass optional, iPhone 17 sales go through the roof, and the UK cracks down on the App Store.
This one goes to -11
When your children ask you what you did in the Great War against Liquid Glass, you can be proud to say you fought on the front lines. By which I mean complaining about it on social media.
Let us not rest on these mighty laurels, however! We must be relentless! There is still much more complaining and posting of screenshots and little videos and stuff to do to eradicate this pestilence!
Because Apple only toned it down, you see.
“Choose your preferred look for Liquid Glass. Clear is more transparent, revealing the content beneath. Tinted increases opacity and adds more contrast,” Apple explains.
In other words, Liquid Glass and not Liquid Glass.…
My thanks to Notify! for sponsoring Six Colors this week. Notify lets you stay effortlessly up-to-date with any changes on websites or RSS feeds that matter to you. It’s free and private, runs on your Apple devices, and there’s no server, subscription, or technical setup required.
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Notify! is simple for everyone, with no coding required for RSS or website monitoring. But you can also push it to the limit, via an API for push notifications from your scripts, ChangeDetection.io integration, Zapier/Make/IFTTT automation, Apple Shortcuts compatibility, and custom webhook triggers.
Notify! is perfect for anyone wanting powerful monitoring without the complexity. Download it on the App Store and start monitoring in seconds.
It’s not quite right to say that for the first five years of its life, the iPad was an iPhone with a really big screen meant to be a lean-back consumption device. After all, the very first iPad shipped with a productivity accessory in the form of the Keyboard Dock.
But ten years ago, Apple got serious. It shipped the very first iPad Pro, and began a decade-long conversation about whether the iPad could be used for work and even whether or not it was a computer.
Today, the M5 iPad Pro and iPadOS 26 have settled a lot of old scores. But it’s been a long, strange journey from “Hey Siri” day in San Francisco to now.
One of the things that I think about from time to time is Apple’s collection of apps. Some are the crown jewels, like Apple’s pro apps, and others help an everyday consumer to tackle their iLife. All are pretty starved for attention and resources, outside of infrequent updates aligned with showing off the native power of Apple Silicon, Apple Intelligence, or demos of platform integration that never quite get all the way there.
Three things really brought this up to the surface for me recently: The neglect of Clips and iMovie, the radio silence regarding Pixelmator/Photomator, and Final Cut Pro being trotted out for demos but not shipping appropriate updates.
Voice commands we use regularly, whether robotic pets benefit society, recent tech features that surprised us, and our e-reader and page turner preferences.
This week’s Apple updates are, to some quarters, boring. Yes, it’s true, there were no real exterior changes this week. Instead, it was just another new Apple-designed processor, with the usual, boring set of speed improvements.
A predictable update schedule means that incremental updates are inevitable. Revolution then evolution is not a bad thing; it’s okay that not every release is exciting or groundbreaking. It’s how technology has worked for decades.
…but some people have short memories. Before the Apple silicon introduction, we all wanted steady, predictable progress in Mac hardware development. We wanted each product in the lineup to be updated regularly and not wither on the vine for years. For the most part, Apple has delivered. Just look at this chart of the progress Apple has made since the M1 on the CPU side of things:
Stephen’s post contains some charts, disappointingly not in some sort of 512 Pixels style where all the “colors” are different Atkinson dithers of gray. Maybe next time.
It reminded me, though, that I have tried to build some charts to help visualize how Apple’s chip progress is going. I wrote about this for the A series of chips back in September. Here are the requisite M series charts:
It’s nearly impossible to isolate the rise in the speed of Apple’s two different kinds of CPU cores, and over time, it tweaks one or the other and changes the mix of both, but obviously each individual core gets faster and the gestalt over the entire processor, whether it’s got eight or ten CPU cores, is a more dramatic move upward.
In the second chart, I’ve divided the Geekbench GPU score by the total number of GPU cores on the system to create an isolated view of per-core GPU performance. As with last month’s A19 Pro release, it’s clear that this generation offers a “standard” bump for the CPU, but a more impressive one for the GPU.
So the very, very broad overview of what the M5 brings is a lot like the overview of the A19: In this generation, the CPU cores got a bit better, and the GPU cores took a much larger jump.
Assuming that M5 Pro and Max chips are in the offing in 2026, loaded with GPU cores, I anticipate some pretty explosive GPU test results. But so far, through five chip generations, Apple has proved to be a bit shifty from generation to generation. It would be wild if it just never released higher-end M chips, wouldn’t it? But not impossible.
Jason has spent a little while with the new M5 iPad Pro, M5 MacBook Pro, and M5 Vision Pro (with accessories!) and we review them all. Also, Apple’s deal with F1 crosses the finish line.
The new 14-inch M5 MacBook Pro is very much like its M4 predecessor, in that it’s got all the advantages of being a MacBook Pro, but by using Apple’s lowest-end M5 chip, it’s also the most affordable model.
Except it’s not the lowest-end M5 chip, at least not so far. It’s the only one. Apple has released a single M5 chip and placed it in three products: this laptop, an iPad Pro, and a Vision Pro. We can probably assume that MacBook Pros powered by M5 Pro and M5 Max chips are in the offing, but unlike in the M4 generation, this base-model MacBook Pro is the only Mac on stage at the debut.
On the one hand, no: Apple’s cutting-edge VR computer hasn’t exactly taken the world by storm. It’s a view of the future that, at its current size and price, doesn’t have much of a place in the present.
On the other hand, it turns out that the M2 processor that powered the Vision Pro was underserving some of its advanced hardware. Apple also probably needed to stop making M2 chips, and the M5 is fresh out of the oven. Upgrading the Vision Pro allows the company to keep it around without a major overhaul.
It’s been ten years since Apple released the first iPad Pro. In 2015, there were already people trying to integrate the five-year-old iPad platform into their working lives, but the wisdom of that choice seemed questionable—at least until Apple validated it by adding a true, professional-level model.
Unfortunately, it’s been a decade of rough sledding. Apple would occasionally feint toward embracing the iPad as a productivity device akin to the Mac, but (with certain exceptions) the experience was just too limited and restrictive.
In the past few years, things have changed. Apple has finally brought its pro media apps, Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro, to the iPad. And with iPadOS 26, Apple has delivered numerous improvements that get the iPad far closer than it has ever been to being a device that can get all sorts of different work done, without the need of a traditional computer as a fallback.
iPadOS 26 especially shines on the M4 iPad Pro, a device with a new, ultra-thin design, and bearing one of the best displays Apple has ever made: a tandem OLED screen with high dynamic range and remarkable brightness and color fidelity.
Into this very different world comes the M5 iPad Pro, which inherits that remarkable design and a much more capable operating system. Pretty nice.
