My point is that 5% is probably an irrelevant number because it’s not 5% additional sales. If the mini wasn’t available, many people would get a normal iPhone instead of switch to Android. So the net sales is closer to 0. Apple seems to agree with this sentiment and there will be no mini starting with the iPhone 14: https://9to5mac.com/2022/03/14/exclusive-iphone-14-coming-in...
Phone sales aren’t driven by switching, and haven’t been for a while, they’re about upgrading. Apple knows this better than anyone.
For example: I upgrade my phone every two years or so, so long as I like the new phones. If I don’t like the new phones, I wait as long as possible.
People that like smaller phones won’t necessarily leave the iPhone if they kill the Mini - they will just keep their current phones for as long as possible. And that can indeed hurt sales, even if Apple doesn’t lose market share.
That's why I picked up an iPhone 13 Mini. It's a really great phone and when I need a new phone six years from now, I'm hoping there's something as good to replace it.
Is there a world where the iPhone mini is necessary or desirable when the iPhone SE also exists? I don't see a need for both, especially when they run the same processor under the hood.
I use an iPhone SE 2016, which uses the same chassis as the iPhone 5/5s.
I tried an iPhone 6S for a year before I got this phone. Couldn't stand the size. The current SE is the same size as the 6S. I'm basically stuck at a dead-end of phone size.
The current SE is not compact by historical standards. I'm not saying all phones need to be smaller, I just want one decent option.
The iPhone SE is a full-sized phone. It just happens to be obsolete in the marketplace, and the other full-sized phones it competes against have become even fuller sized.
5% of 200,000,000 is 10,000,000.
5% can be a huge number, or a tiny number, depending on what it's 5% of.
I switched from Android to Apple specifically for the iPhone mini, and if they killed it, I would switch to the smallest phone on the market.