How do iPhone and iPad Storage Upgrades Compare?
As we analyze drivers of Apple revenues and margins, last week we looked closely at how iPhone buyers upgrade storage. We showed that these upgrades have slowed down somewhat in recent periods.
Interestingly, Apple can’t persuade a significant percentage of iPad buyers to upgrade their base storage, either. The comparison is instructive and suggests a similar consumer perspective despite different use cases between the two product lines.
In the twelve months ending December 2024, less than half of iPhone buyers upgraded from base storage, with one notable exception (Chart 1). Almost two-thirds of buyers of iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max models upgraded storage in that period. Note Apple replaced iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max with the next generation iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max near the end of the September quarter, so the data reflects only about three quarters of sales.
Chart 1: Percent of iPhone and iPad buyers upgrading from base storage, by model (twelve months ending December 2024)
We compared these storage upgrade patterns to those of iPad buyers. Apple offers a similar range of storage upgrades for iPad models. With the release of the newest iPad models in May and October, base storage starts at either 128 GB or 256 GB depending on the model. The entry points were lower for the previous generation iPads. At the high end, Apple offers storage as large as 2TB on the iPad Pro models, while the others top out at 256GB for the base, 1 TB for the Air models, and 512GB for the mini.
A somewhat similar share of iPad buyers, a little under half, upgrade from base storage. The exception is iPad mini, for which only one-third of buyers upgrade from base storage.
Why do iPad and iPhone buyers upgrade from base storage at similar rates when there are somewhat different use cases between them? iPad owners use devices to consume content more than to communicate with others. One might think that maintaining sufficient storage capacity for on-device video or music would drive upgrades, but it doesn’t.
Half of iPad buyers have only WiFi access and half also have a cellular connection. Of course, all iPhones have both. So one might expect iPad buyers to demand more native storage, for times when they cannot stream their entertainment, like when traveling or in transit. Despite this, iPad buyers are tracking the latest iPhone buyer trend, relying on streaming or somehow finding enough capacity on a base storage iPad to meet their entertainment needs.