Official Apple figures peg iOS 10 adoption rate at 54%

By Mikey Campbell

Apple this week released the first official statistics on iOS 10 adoption since the OS went live in September, revealing more than half of compatible devices are now running current generation software.

Announced in an update to Apple's developer support website, iOS 10 powered 54 percent of iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices measured through the App Store as of Oct. 7.

Though adoption rates are growing, Apple's official numbers are far lower than those published by outside market research firms.

Mixpanel, for example, put iOS 10 adoption at 55 percent on Sept. 30, a figure identical to separate findings from AppLovin. Mixpanel's iOS 10 numbers jumped to 64.30 percent on Oct. 7, and the firm's live tracker shows Apple's latest OS powering around 67.55 percent of compatible devices as of this writing.

As with previous iOS releases, consumer uptake has been expectedly brisk. In lieu of official statistics from Apple, initial figures from Mixpanel put adoption at 14 percent after just 24 hours of availability.

It appears, however, that consumers this year are slower to make the switch as compared to prior iOS releases. Half of all users were running iOS 9 only four days after its release last year, for example.

For 2016, Apple's mobile OS delivers a handful of design enhancements and feature additions to Messages, Maps, Siri, Photos, Apple Music, News, and more. Perhaps most meaningful are changes in policy that allow third-party access to first-party platforms like Siri and Messages, the latter of which now boasts its own App Store featuring app extensions and stickers.

Apple's iOS 10 is available as a free update and can be downloaded through the Software Update function in the Settings app.