Reception and legacy
The original iPhone has been described as "revolutionary",[187] a "breakthrough handheld computer",[188] and "the best phone that anybody has ever made".[189] It is now Apple's bestselling product, and has been credited with helping to make Apple one of the world's most valuable publicly traded companies by 2011.[190] Newer iterations have also received praise and awards.[191][192]
Before the iPhone, smartphones were mostly used for texting, calls, and email; more advanced functions were harder to use and inconvenient on a small screen.[193] They were also hard to develop for, and lacked a thriving app ecosystem like the App Store (released in 2008).[194][195] Many phones were heavily customized by mobile carriers, which led to feature fragmentation and prevented these phones from turning into thriving software platforms.[196] In contrast, Apple's iPhone SDK provided a wide range of APIs, made mobile development far more accessible,[197][198] and was instrumental in turning the iPhone into a "Swiss army knife" with a wide range of features and apps.[193]
Successive iPhone models have generated significant fan enthusiasm, with many customers queuing up in front of Apple Stores on launch day.[199] As of 2021, the iPhone has higher brand loyalty than any other smartphone.[200]
The iPhone's success has led to the decline of incumbents Nokia, BlackBerry, and Motorola.[201][202] RIM, Symbian and Microsoft all attempted to develop more modern operating systems to compete with the iPhone, like Maemo, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry 10; all were unsuccessful. Google successfully started over on their Android project,[193] and designed it for mass adoption by carriers and phone hardware manufacturers.[203] Today, iOS and Android account for 99% of smartphones used worldwide.[204]