It’s really good and durable if users don’t change their hardware so often. This also shows that it’s durable. Nevertheless, a new survey does not bode well for Apple: As market research company Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) has found, Macs are now being used for longer than before. This means that Apple is missing out on opportunities to sell more products. The reason is apparently the switch to Apple Silicon, which the company created in 2020. This made the particularly popular MacBook more powerful with longer battery life, while the systems work almost fanless – a stark contrast to the previous Mac world with Intel chips.
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In 2020, users wanted to switch faster
As CIRP writes, the difference is statistically significant. According to the company’s information base, which consists mainly of anonymous purchase data from Western countries, in 2020 59 percent of Mac users reported that their computer was two years old or older. In the last recorded 12-month period, which ended in March 2024, CIRP now has 68 percent of users with computers that old. Only 13 percent of machines were less than a year old, 19 percent were one to two years old, and 13 percent were two to three years old.
“The trend to use devices for longer periods of time is slow but steady,” the market researchers wrote. “As computer users rely more and more on streaming and web-based applications and programs, the traditional motivation for a computer upgrade has diminished.” Most computer owners have enough storage space and fast enough processing speeds on their current computer. The most important purchasing factor is increased battery life – and Apple has already optimized this significantly with the M1 SoC from 2020.
iPhone lasts longer too
CIRP also collected iPhone data. Here, the rate of devices owned for two years or more increased from 63 percent (2020) to 71 percent (as of March 2024). Although improvements are now mainly gradual with new SoCs such as the M4 coming to the Mac, Apple still has a good chance of the next “supercycle” on the iPhone: the new AI function as part of Apple Intelligence only runs on the current device (currently only on the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max), which may encourage users to upgrade.
With the Mac, Apple could be making changes to the form factor. While the MacBook Air 13 is a thin and light device, the company still hasn’t gotten close to the 12-inch MacBook, which was discontinued in 2019 with Apple Silicon. However, there have been some rumors here recently.
(B.Sc.)
