Yes as it takes Apple at least a year to get most of the bugs fixed.
11 Jan 26 Oh, edit here. I do have the Security updates enabled but not the features updates.
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I’m sure that I could update to iOS 26 and macOS 26 without too much trouble, but I have been hoping that adoption is slow enough that Apple receives a message. Usability matters. I plan on staying with iOS 18 and macOS 15.x as long as is practical.
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Staying on older recent macOS versions was easy because Apple and other still support them with fixes. I just wished Apple would do the same for its iOS even though iPhones can run v26. I doubt Apple will change its mind to release newer iOS v18.7.x updates for them. Only for the older iPhones that can’t run iOS v26. :(
Add me to the list of iOS 18.7.2 holdouts. Using iPhone 13 with a Mac limited to macOS 15 Sequoia, and I’m happy with their current functionality. The Ai, GUI and other new features hold limited appeal for me.
A significant leap forward for Siri while improving privacy generally would probably motivate me to purchase a new Mac and upgrade iOS or even the iPhone itself. But what’s on offer now is not worth the disruption.
One could almost read that as Apple has a stinker and knows it, so they’ll need to force the issue a bit. And I remember a time when many folks, including myself, would line up outside Apple Stores on release day to part with $129 in exchange for a single license disc of the new OS for Mac!
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I just bought a new laptop M4 Pro 48GB 2TB Nanotexture display, and again purposefully not M5 so I can stay on Sequoia. Yes, it’s a beast of a machine.
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I’m not Dennis, but just wanted to add my cynicism about “security fixes” from Apple.
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these fixes imho apply to only rare users and situations (but we cannot know: see point 2)
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Apple does not explain in common language, despite having the talent on staff, so that users can decide for themselves the risk/reward decision of applying the fixes
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They intentionally use something similar to ‘dark patterns’ concept to get users to do what they want, like (point 2 and) burying default-on new ‘features’ in obscure Settings locations at bottom of the list, and making extra work for users who don’t want, say, to use a Passcode on a device, hiding the ‘don’t want it’ button for various things in an undisplayed scroll section, devising a complex Settings app and not indexing it to include everything in it, etc.
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This all adds up to scare tactics broadly used over the years to manipulate users to just do what Apple tells them to do.
Maybe I’m turning rotten in my age but being an Apple product user since the early 1980s, when I perceived things to be much more friendly, developments of recent years show, imho, a very different company.
(I won’t be offended if this rant is deleted).
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Apple has become a much bigger company over the past four decades, and instead of being upstarts they are now among the biggest companies in computing/IT. I try to avoid conspiracy theories, but could Big Tech becoming dependent on planned obsolescence to keep their market growing?
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That leads to another thought @jeff1 You can’t talk planned obsolescence out of one side of your face and concern for the environment out of the other. All tech (yes, that means you too Apple) needs to take this into consideration.
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There seem to be rather significant differences in the iOS 26 adoption statistics from different places.
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Who knows if the Analytics Advisor in Google Analytics is at all accurate, but it suggests that TidBITS iOS traffic is 91% iOS 18. I don’t think I believe it, but as I said in another thread, I don’t have much luck using Google Analytics effectively.
I have updated the numbers for iOS 26 and iOS 18 for the period from September 15th, 2025, to today.
Here is the breakdown of users for this period:
- iOS 26: 4,168 active users
- iOS 18: 41,237 active users
Based on these numbers, here are the relative percentages:
- iOS 26: 9.2%
- iOS 18: 90.8%
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Have you tried using one of the browser ai assistant sidebar to operate Google Analytics. Just prompt what you want and it’ll do it.
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Yes, that’s what I was referring to with Analytics Advisor. Unless you mean the AI sidebar in something like Dia or Comet?
That’s what I meant.
Comet, Dia, Claude in Chrome, Atlas, Opera, etc
I have an iPhone 14 or so, and I don’t want iOS 26 on it because of what I’ve read about Liquid Glass. It just sounds like a change for the sake of change, which is disappointing: it’s possible to get things right and leave them be. Some of the (excellent as usual) comments here have made me think of older physical tools (as opposed to digital tools), where they are fixed in terms of design: so, we have some very old hammers in the basement, like from the 1950s perhaps, and they are 100% fine. No need to change. Got it right, still works. Fits in my hand, swings well, hits the nail. It’s good, you don’t need to change it, and okay right you can’t change it unless you buy a new one, it’s a fixed physical form. But the idea is that you can make it well enough, and leave it be. (Perfect is the enemy of good and done – maybe Steve Jobs said that?)
With the digital, you can change it, and maybe the problem is you are expected to over time regardless of anything. I know we’ve seen tech press articles have this ideology. I think it’s a deeply flawed approach. (I think I’m thinking of Donald Norman’s work: The Design of Everyday Things - Wikipedia )
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I tried this, but they all failed pretty miserably on their own, though they did tell me how to set up the report properly. Once I set the page up correctly for them (since there are many 18 and 26 subversions), I asked them to calculate the numbers, and I got iOS 18 percentages between 73% and 87% and iOS 26 at 9–12%. However, Dia came up with 80/12 and when I copied the raw numbers and asked Comet and ChatGPT Atlas to restrict themselves to the pasted numbers, they agreed. So 80/12 would seem to be the best guess right now.
Of course, that assumes Google Analytics has accurate iOS version data, which is another issue entirely.