The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus launch was incremental for Apple and the recent reports about the market prove that the company was more than successful with their supposedly reinvented new line-up of smartphones. The iPhone 6 Plus is now a market leader in the phablet category on an international scale, with China sitting at the top, where most people actually prefer the iPhone 6 Plus over the regular iPhone 6. All that is tremendous and Apple is surely proud of having once again dominated the smartphone market in one way or another. How various users feel about that aspect should be discussed separately, though.
The iPhone 6 doesn’t just embody a new trend in smartphones and marketing, and overall trend when it comes to brands (as if Apple weren’t the top tech brand until now, but it also sets the bar higher for the company when it comes to future releases. As such, people are already wondering about what will come after the iPhone 6, Since the Cupertino-based company does have a history of making durable smartphones, some people didn’t find it necessary to upgrade to the iPhone 6 or 6 Plus just yet, as many are still satisfied with what the iPhone 4 and iPhone 5 variants can do. As long as there are software updates, there are people that chose to wait a bit more before upgrading their Apple product library.
Nobody can tell you at this moment what to expect as the successor of the iPhone 6. Tim Cook and co. have not made any announcements that would detail what lies ahead in the future of the Apple iPhone line-up, but there is a considerable number of rumors and speculations out there. Although leaked photos and specs aren’t that common this early in the year, there still have been a few that describe or attempt to describe the successor of the iPhone 6. Some say that this Summer we will be greeted by an iPhone 6S, while others are confident that we should be looking forward to the October release date of the iPhone 7.
Since we can’t be completely sure what the company is actually planning, we do know that the next iteration in the Apple smartphone line-up will do one of two things: improve the iPhone 6 or make the iPhone 6 cheaper. Or at least those are the two ideologies surrounding various rumors about successors. The iPhone 6S would be the cheaper variant of the iPhone 6 according to various sources, rumors and speculations that seem to be rather consistent so early on. As with the iPhone 5C, the iPhone 6S will attempt to make more Android or Windows users convert by offering a cheaper alternative to the flagship iPhone 6 or even iPhone 6 Plus. Apple usually wants to appeal to those with smaller pockets later in the year after their flagship launch, so this scenario seems pretty likely for this Summer.
Even if people are not sure whether these assumptions are real or not, we can assume that there has to be some truth to them. Based on company history as well as marketing strategy, Apple would be right in launching a cheaper variant of the iPhone 6, the iPhone 6S. Rumors say that this alleged cheaper alternative would abandon the metal chassis, but leave the fingerprint sensor, which is something that Apple didn’t do with the iPhone 5C. This time around they will most likely compromise more on design rather than features to make the phone affordable because surely Apple has realized that in order to gain fans in the Android community, their software needs to catch up. Although iOS 8 was a good step forward, there still needs to be more than to the software in order to make it truly appealing to die-hard Android users.
The iPhone 7, on the other hand, seems to be the improved, upgraded and pimped out version of the iPhone 6, or so the rumors say. There have been tons of patent filings flying around and people are already wondering whether at least one of those revolutionary technologies will be present in the iPhone 7. Although we doubt that a joystick home button would be implemented any time soon, we do expect Apple to start selling styli, so the iPhone 7 might actually be the first Apple iPhone to come with its own stylus. Moreover, the recent fascination of people with bezelless displays and edge-displays as seen on the Galaxy S6 might push Tim Cook towards designing and engineering an iPhone 6 successor that will meet these new standards. Moreover, iOS 9 should also be around the corner and that will be the true deciding factor in my opinion.
If iOS 9 improves on the buggy nature of iOS 8 and becomes a more open operating system, Android fans might just be swayed. Although I’m convinced that there will be many Android fans that won’t have any of it, there will be some that will look at other factors than just brand loyalty. As Android users, we usually admit to iOS and OS X being faster and more reliable on occasion than Android, especially with Lollipop encountering so many bugs and issues. The thing that I find bothers most Android users about Apple, iOS, OS X or the iPhone 6 is the closed ecosystem that it operates within. As both Google and Microsoft are moving towards a more friendly, expansive ecosystem that aims to include all types of smartphone users, Apple seems to be withdrawing from that idea and keeps on targeting the closed ecosystem it has had for years. Even though those iPhone 6 owners who already live within this ecosystem and are accustomed to having all-Apple tech in their homes will find this strategy fitting, if Apple wants new customers, they are going to have to change a thing or two, or at least make things more customizable than they are right now.
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Overall, we can’t know for sure whether the iPhone 6 will be followed by the iPhone 6S or the iPhone 7. That’s anyone’s guess at this moment, and we’re awaiting Apple confirmation on what to expect in the future. Most people tend to agree upon the fact that the iPhone 6S will either be a cheaper version of the iPhone 6 or a slightly upgraded version of it, while the iPhone 7 will be “like a totally new smartphone”. We will just have to see. In any case, Apple will launch one of these either this Summer or this Fall, so stay tuned to find out more. We’re on the look-out for rumors and statements from the company so we will keep you updated.
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