iOS 17 adoption is slower than iOS 16

iOS 17 has already been with us for a few months and we are starting to turn on the lights to anticipate what will be new regarding Apple’s next major operating system: iOS 18. Every year, Apple offers a series of data in the month of February in which is detailed What is the adoption rate of the current operating system. This way we can directly see how the update has affected globally and segmented in each iPhone distribution. On this occasion, iOS 17 adoption is slower

than iOS 16:a 66% of all iPhones already have iOS 17 installed.

Apple releases iOS 17 adoption data

How quickly or slowly an operating system installs is measured by the Adoption rate, which is nothing more than the % of devices that have a certain version installed. Apple typically provides this data twice a year: once at the start of the calendar year (about 6 months after the official launch) and again a few weeks before the start of that year’s WWDC in which the next operating system is presented.

Whether or not you install a certain update depends on many factors: security provided to us, new features introduced, personal experiences with the performance of previous updates, etc. However, For Apple it is essential that we update our products to keep up to date with the patching of security vulnerabilities and any features they deem relevant to users.

iOS 17 adoption rate is 66% across all iPhones

On this occasion, Apple published adoption data for iOS and iPadOS 17 and we see how Installing iOS 17 is slower than adopting iOS 16

Last year. As you can see in the table, Apple separates data across all devices (iPhone or iPad) and most modern devices (last 4 years). In this way, if we look at the world, we see how the 66% of iPhones have iOS 17 and the 53% of iPads are equipped with iPadOS 17.

	iPadOS/iOS 17	iPadOS/iOS 16	Previous iPadOS/iOS
iPhones (last 4 years)	76%	20%	4%
All iPhones	66%	23%	11%
iPads (last 4 years)	61%	29%	ten%
All iPads	53%	29%	18%

To compare this data, we must review the adoption data from February 2023 around iOS 16 and we see how iOS 16 has been installed on 81% of modern iPhones (the last 4 years) and 72% on all iPhones. While iPadOS 17 has been installed on 53% of modern iPads (the last 4 years) and 50% off all iPads.