Has anyone had success upgrading old iPhone past ios14?

Clokwork

apps are starting not to work and I’m looking at my options. I’m hesitant upgrading my iPhone 11 past ios14 where I am now.

WhisperingWind

I have an old iPad Pro 11" from 2017. It's running 14.6. The device is very comfortable on this version. I'm also afraid to install updates, and I'm curious if anyone has had a positive experience updating devices with IPS screens.

AgentX20

My iphone SE (2nd gen) is good all the way through iOS 17. (good == not perfect but very tolerable)

iOS 18 however felt really off, so I've reverted to 17.7.

DisplaysShouldNotBeTVs

AgentX20 My SE 2 is entirely unusable on iOS 17.2.1, even worse than OLED iPhones

illusi0n

I’ve experienced the exact same issue with iOS 18. Everything was fine up until 17.7, but iOS 18 gives me severe eye strain. It seems like something in the graphics subsystem changed - possibly dithering was enabled in this update, not sure. I'm using an iPhone 12 Pro and a 13 mini, but I had to downgrade both back to 17.7 to avoid the discomfort.

ocean10

I posted a summary of what works for me a few months ago:

https://ledstrain.org/d/2683-severe-symptoms-updating-old-iphone-started-a-summary-of-goodbad-versions

Reposting the chart here below. Something seems to have changed in one of the updates between iOS 16.1.1 and 16.3 (haven't been able to find devices to test on the versions in between those). There also seems to be an issue for very old devices that can't support higher iOS versions but still can get updates for sub-versions. (for example I have an iPhone 7 that was perfect for years. It can't go past iOS 15 but I let it install an update this February (to iOS 15.8.1) and it became unusable. I really wish we could fine somebody at Apple who understands what changed or how the rendering is different. It gives me some hope that a software update did this rather than hardware. Visually I can't see any differences between the screens. But good ones I can use indefinitely and bad ones give me symptoms pretty quickly (though not "quite" as fast as OLED Apple devices which give me symptoms immediately)

Bad Devices - (Cause Immediate Symptoms)

	iOS Version
iPad 6th Gen	16.3.1
iPad Pro 1st Gen (9.7 inch)	16.6.1
iPad 9th Gen	17.0.1
iPhone 7	15.8.1
iPhone SE 2020 Generation	16.3

Good Devices - (No Symptoms and can use indefinitely)

	iOS Version
iPhone SE 2022	16.1.1
iPhone SE 2020	15.4
iPhone SE 2020	13.7
iPad Pro 1st Gen (9.7 inch)	15.4
iPhone 7	13.5.1
iPhone 6	11.0.3

asus389

I have a 6S 32GB space gray that is at 15.8.3 and it’s ok for me. It’s pretty slow and limited by 2GB of RAM and some apps are no longer supporting iOS 15. But no eye strain.

I did notice some of the minor updates to iOS 15 (maybe in the 15.6.x range) caused issues for me, but then subsequent updates reverted to graphics that were OK again. It’s pretty weird.

Clokwork

I guess I’m stuck on 14 forever then. My iPad and iPhone are both on this version. I miss having a working banking app heh. I’m super disappointed in Apple for making these changes with no notice, update log, or anything to that effect.

Clokwork

I wish the iPhone SE came in a larger size. I tried it in store and it was surprisingly frustrating to use.