Yesterday I learned that users start to consider the operating systems 26 a flop, that up to now only 15% of iPhone users switched to iOS 26, and that John Gruber at “Daring Fireball” advises users not to switch to macOS 26.2.
In December Apple informed its users of two serious security problems and suggested to immediately update to iOS 18.7.3 or better to iOS 26.2. I was running iOS 18.7.2 and waited 4 days for the appearance of iOS 18.7.3 that never showed up. In the end I felt compelled to update to iOS 26.2, a decision that I heavily regret. Though I managed to limit the Liquid Glass effects, I find the user interface utterly unintuitive and awkward.
Obviously it is not possible to downgrade from iOS 26 to iOS 18.7. Or is it?
Two questions remain for me. Does Apple realise that it hurt its reputation? What does or will Apple do to alleviate or to eliminate the problems it has caused to its users.
So far I have had no problems with 26 on my Mini M4, my iPhone 17 Pro Max, our Apple TV 4K, or my wife’s MBA MacBook Air (15-inch, M2, 2023). I waited to upgrade until 26.2 for the Mini and MBA.
I wonder if Apple’s branding of all of its OS’s as "xxx"OS 26 combined with the high amounts of negative coverage of Tahoe (macOS 26) has hurt adoption of iOS 26 and iPad OS 26.
Personally, I’ve been using 26 on my iPhone and iPad since it came out. It did cause a short period of disorientation, as pretty much all of Apple’s major updates to both OS’s and applications do, but now I don’t even notice it.
Perhaps, but we have to be careful not to anthropomorphize a $4 trillion company with 166,000 employees. There is no “Apple” that worries about its reputation. There are undoubtedly many people in marketing and PR who think about this, but probably more from the perspective of reducing negative attention.
What it always does, which is to try to address the major pain points quietly while pretending nothing is wrong. Apple will almost never acknowledge any weakness or mistakes.
Just to underscore how true this is, we need to recall how people were taken by surprise in the rare instances where Apple did do just that. Like the public apology after the Maps fiasco. There’s also the iPhone free bumper program, although I guess many would argue they did that under intense pressure and appeared rather unwilling to admit to any wrongdoing.