I recently posted this on Threads:

My regular reminder that anytime someone says “99% of users” is completely making things up and has done precisely zero investigation outside of their own experience.

Once you notice this, you start to see it everywhere. People have a very bad habit of assuming “everyone” does something, when that’s simply not the case. Especially when it comes to software usage, there is basically nothing out there that 99% of people agree on, and throwing out “99% of people think…” just reads to me as someone trying to shut down conversation over metrics that person absolutely does not have any idea about.

If we apply this to the “nobody buys a new iPhone every year” sentiment you see come out this time every single year like clockwork, I think we can come to the same conclusion: people saying this have no idea what they’re talking about.

Consumer Affairs has some data on smartphone use and ownership in the United States that’s interesting, and SellCell has some good data on how often people around the world upgrade their phone. While the most common upgrade cycle is 2-3 years (40%), and a similar amount (39%) upgrade in 4 or more year cycles, a full 21% of people upgrade their phone at least once per year. Given an estimated 316 million smartphone owners in the US today, that’s 66 million Americans who buy a new phone every year.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you that’s the average, but that’s a significant portion of the population, it’s not just nerds like us with tech blogs. I know some people who are well to do, aren’t major techies, but they like having nice things and when there’s a new iPhone, they figure why not just get it? We spend hours a day on the things and we capture important moments in our lives with them, so if you have the means to keep up, then why not?

Also, just a side note, I think we underestimate how many people enjoy tech and like getting new goodies. It’s not just the folks who also talk about it on social media.

So yes, the majority of people don’t buy a new smartphone every year, but as with basically all “99% of people…” statements, it’s absolutely not true that “nobody” updates their phone every year, it’s actually tens of millions of Americans.