Apple has done a lot in 2022, but as we close the ledgers on what still feels like a recovery year for humanity, it’s hard to find anything that had as big an impact as Apple Silicon.
Because Apple’s own chip program now supports 99% of its desktops, laptops, tablets and iPhones, it has an outsized impact on everything Apple does. The complete control that Apple enjoys over all of its product lines – from silicon to components to build and down to software, interfaces and services – is now unparalleled.
It’s not just that Apple has achieved its goal of migrating almost everything about Apple silicon this year is that the company continues to make unparalleled leaps in mobile performance.
“Yes, Apple Silicon was a big story and continues to be a big story. All their half [conductor] competitors are struggling to achieve the same power/battery improvements that Apple has in the M1 and M2 chips, and are at least a year behind, if not more,” Apple analyst and Creative Strategies chairman Tim Bajarin said via email. .
Unlike Intel, which unveils chips and then waits a few months for its partners to deliver systems built around them, Apple delivered the 5-nanometer process, 20 billion transistors, 10-core GPU M2 alongside a new MacBook Air with the new Apple Silicon .
At the same time, Apple was able to unveil the next generation of all software platforms that would run on its new desktops and laptops (macOS Ventura) and future iPads (iPadOS 16) and iPhones (iOS 16).
This mobile cadence of software and then, three months later, the hardware to support it is both predictable and efficient.
While the Apple Silicon story generated a lot of excitement, the rest of Apple’s 2022 was more of a mixed bag. Admittedly, Apple’s mixed bag is someone else’s year of celebration.
The new M2 MacBook Air is a perfect example of a product that is likely to split Apple fans in half. The redesigned chassis dispensed with an iconic design in favor of an ultraportable computer that could be mistaken for someone else’s hardware. To be fair, the industry has been drawn to Apple’s once signature curved aluminum chassis design, so much so that Apple had to take a different path.
Apple’s iPhone 14 wasn’t the flashy redesign some were hoping for, but I still don’t think it got enough credit for the Dynamic Island (only available on the iPhone 14 Pro models). And Emergency SOS via Satellite across the line is also worth celebrating.
Unfortunately, Apple may have miscalculated again on a new variant of iPhone format. People seem to be just as excited about the iPhone 14 Plus as they are about the iPhone 13 mini, which is to say not very much.
The big story from an iPhone perspective, at least for me, was iOS 16 and the updates to focus, notifications, Messages, emails, and the lock screen. Apple’s decision to tweak core features, such as the ability to edit messages after you’ve sent them, shouldn’t be overlooked. Raise your hand if you have already used this feature.
Apple took a similarly cautious approach with the Apple Watch 8, a nimble and still excellent smartwatch that’s been overshadowed by the beefier and more powerful Apple Watch Ultra. Will the Ultra be a big hit? Too early to tell, but I bet it’s too much watch for most people.
In many ways, 2022 felt like a gap year for Apple. Look at the Apple iPad line. While the awesomely powerful 12.9 M2-powered iPad Pro doesn’t do much on the design side, it pushes tablet power into new and unknown spaces.
Then you have the iPad 10.9, which takes the flagship tablet into a new design space, but is saddled with an aging (though still decent) CPU and a last-generation Apple Pencil.
I’m also struck by the things Apple hasn’t done in 2022. There was still no word or banter about the Apple Car. This cursed project looks no closer to reality than it did five years ago. That won’t stop anyone from writing about it, but mark my words, we won’t know more about this iCar by the end of 2023 than we do now.
Many of us, including myself, thought Apple was teasing its AR glasses when it talked about “Peek Performance” back in the spring. I was wrong. As with so many new category innovations these days, Apple is taking its time. Not everyone was fooled.
“I never expected AR glasses in 2022, and I’m not sure we’ll even see them in 2023. In talks with the supply chain, there are still real challenges to get the optics, Bluetooth radios and rugged designs in place. to meet the demands and needs of their customers,” Bajarin wrote to me.
This brings me to some of Apple’s biggest challenges in 2022. Tim Cook mentioned more than once supply chain issues during the year and in particular how they could impact iPhone availability. It hasn’t been that bad, but with some of the new Covid shutdowns in China, things could get a little worse in the spring.
Bajarin agreed that the supply chain was easily one of Apple’s biggest challenges in 2022.
“That Zero Covid policy from [China’s] President XI was disastrous for them and others. It will take at least another two quarters to get better,” Bajarin wrote.
As the year came to a close, Apple faced some real challenges to its basic App Store principles, with the European Union nearly forcing it to accept third-party stores on its devices. The EU may also accelerate Apple’s existing plans to move the iPhone to USB-C. That’s not a big deal, but I can’t imagine Apple and CEO Tim Cook enjoying being pressured.
And lately there’s been a bit of tit-for-tat with Twitter’s Elon Musk.
Twitter has long been one of the App Store’s most popular apps, but Musk’s management of the brand has been a disaster. He’s desperate for real revenue and profit through subscriptions, especially for those tied to the new beleaguered Twitter Blue Verification program.
Naturally, Musk should keep all that money and not pay Apple the 30% discount for in-app purchases. Naturally, Musk made his complaints about the fee and what he sees as Apple’s App Store monopoly public on Twitter. He even threatened to build his own phone.
Eventually, Cook and Musk met in private and worked things out. But whatever that skirmish looked like to us. Bajarin said it was no problem.
“The fight between Twitter and Musk was more of a nuisance than it caused Apple any real problems,” he wrote.
Even with Apple’s great service program taking a surprise drop in revenue this year, 2022 was a really good year for Apple. The growing market share is poised to deliver an even more exciting set of iPhones next year and is sure to wow us again with the new Apple Silicon (Hello, M3) in 2023.