When will your iPhone model become ‘obsolete’? Official Apple warnings revealed

IF you’re clinging onto a pretty old iPhone it could become obsolete soon.

As Apple releases new models each year it spells the end for others before it.

Apple is pretty good at keeping old devices going, though they will start to get very slow.

Generally, an iPhone is considered obsolete when Apple stopped selling it more than seven years ago.

Obsolete means Apple no longer provides any hardware service repairs.

So which phones are currently on the dead list? And which will be on it soon?

Which iPhones are obsolete?

If you own – and still use – one of these, it is officially an obsolete iPhone.

• iPhone
• iPhone 3G (China mainland) 8GB
• iPhone 3G 8GB, 16GB
• iPhone 3GS (China mainland) 16GB, 32GB
• iPhone 3GS (8GB)
• iPhone 3GS 16GB, 32GB
• iPhone 4 CDMA
• iPhone 4 CDMA (8GB)
• iPhone 4 16GB, 32GB
• iPhone 4 GSM (8GB), Black
• iPhone 4S (8GB)

Considering the newest on this list, the iPhone 4S, was released in 2011, it’s hardly surprising.

Which iPhones will be obsolete next?

Apple defines iPhones that it stopped distributing for sale more than five and less than seven years ago as “vintage”.

This means they are close to the chopping block next.

Those on the vintage list include:

• iPhone 4 (8GB)
• iPhone 4S
• iPhone 5
• iPhone 5C
• iPhone 6 Plus

So if you’ve managed to continue using an obsolete iPhone this long, it’s probably worth getting a new one – not least of all, it can be a major security risk with old software.

Those on the vintage list can hang on a bit longer, but some are also at risk from hackers due no version of iOS available for them

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