iOS 8 Now Installed on Over Half of Active iOS Devices

Tuesday October 28, 2014 4:46 pm PDT by Juli Clover

After five and a half weeks of availability, Apple's iOS 8 operating system is now installed on 52 percent of iOS devices, according to new numbers posted on Apple's App Store support page for developers.

iOS 8's installation numbers have increased approximately four percent over the course of the two weeks, which means adoption numbers are on the rise after several weeks of stagnation. During Apple's October 16 iPad-centric event, Apple CEO Tim Cook said that iOS 8 was installed on 48 percent of devices as of October 13, and before that, the OS was installed on 46 percent of devices on September 21.

ios8adoptionrate

The jump in iOS 8 installation numbers follows the October 20 release of iOS 8.1, which brought several new features that undoubtedly enticed iOS users to upgrade, including Apple Pay support, SMS Forwarding, Instant Hotspot, iCloud Photo Library beta access, and the return of the Camera Roll.

iOS 8.1 also addressed several notable bugs that had been present in the operating system for several weeks and that were the source of several user complaints about iOS 8. The update fixed Wi-Fi connection issues, Bluetooth problems, screen rotation bugs, and more.

Apple's own iOS 8 adoption estimates are based on App Store usage and are mirrored closely by data from MixPanel, which puts iOS 8 adoption at just over 54 percent. MixPanel's numbers suggest installation rates have been trending upwards since the release of iOS 8.1.

mixpanelios8adoption

iOS 8's release was plagued with a number of early bugs that may have scared users away from updating. Ahead of launch, all HealthKit-enabled apps were pulled from the App Store due to a major HealthKit bug, and the fix for that issue, iOS 8.0.1, brought its own bugs, disabling cellular service and Touch ID for thousands of iPhone 6 and 6 Plus users.

iOS 8.0.2 fixed the problems introduced with iOS 8.0.1 and brought several other bug fixes, and with iOS 8.1 fixing even more issues with iOS 8, the operating system is far more stable now than it was in the days following its release.

Top Rated Comments

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batting1000

68 months ago

Buggy Software Now Installed on Over Half of Active iOS Devices

Rating: 33 Votes

RockSpider

68 months ago

If most people could go back to 7 there would be less than 10% on 8.

Rating: 27 Votes

trip1ex

68 months ago

updating ipad 2 made it much slower. Think twice about updating older iOS devices.

Rating: 19 Votes

teslo

68 months ago

if you been havin iOS problems i feel bad for you son, i got 99 things to do but b1tchin ain't one.

Rating: 17 Votes

afsnyder

68 months ago

I wonder how many people updated their older phones thinking they could get Apple Pay.... even though it was only available to iPhone 6 and 6 Plus because of hardware..

Rating: 16 Votes

RealKrS

68 months ago

Probably also increased when people (like myself) realized that they could no longer use Pages, Numbers etc without updating. Was forced to update my 3rd gen iPad earlier today in order to use Pages.
Now I can finally use Pages on my NOW UNSTABLE iPad. :apple:

Rating: 13 Votes

Watabou

68 months ago

If most people could go back to 7 there would be less than 10% on 8.

I highly doubt that. And besides, I think the people who haven't upgraded yet are not waiting for iOS 8 to get less buggy, they just ran out of space. I had to clear about 5 GB of space on my 16 GB iPhone to update to iOS 8, and that's a lot of space to clear if you don't use iTunes to update. I still have no idea why Apple continues to sell the 16GB iPhone.

Buggy Software Now Installed on Over Half of Active iOS Devices

Honestly, iOS7 for me was far more buggier than 8.1 is. I've never had better battery life, and faster animations than 8.1. I'm actually really happy with it. And I use an iPhone 5, which is not exactly fast by today's standards.

Rating: 13 Votes