Apple TV

In years past, I got a new laptop every 3 years. I upgraded my phone every year, or every two years. Early on, I even upgraded my watch kinda frequently.

Today, in 2025, I'm rocking an iPhone 14 Pro I got when it was introduced. In January of this year, it developed a charging port problem that led Apple to replace it with a brand new 14 Pro essentially for free, so right now I have an almost-new phone despite being 3 years past my "purchase" date. It's great! The 17 is pretty and all, but the 14 is still awesome and works fine. I don't see a good reason to buy a new phone, so I guess I'll re-evaluate in 2026.

I bought this M1 Macbook Pro in October of 2021. It, too, still runs great. I'm amazed at the battery life, and have only heard the fans a couple times (turns out? processing Insta360 video WILL turn 'em on). I did just buy my wife a new Air, so that probably pushes any upgrade for me off for a year, and I'm fine with that. But 5 years as a primary computer is unprecedented for me; it wasn't too many years ago (ok, maybe it was) that a 3 year old machine was barely keeping up, but this M1 is still awesome.

The watch cycle is closest to "normal," I guess. I bought my first one -- the base model -- in 2016 to run with. I liked it so much I mostly quit wearing fancy watches, so a year later I popped for a fancy steel model. I wore that one for about 3 years, and then upgraded to a titanium model in 2020. In January of 2023 I bought an original Ultra, and I still wear that most days. It still holds a charge VERY well, and I've been lucky enough to keep it nice, so the new model holds no charm for me. Maybe next year.

I'm sure EVERYTHING introduced today is excellent, and is probably excellent in ways you can't see until you use them a bit. But none of it is a big enough leap to justify an early upgrade, or even an upgrade from a 3 year old device as long as that device is still running fine.