Last week, a report from StatCounter claimed that iOS 26 was largely shunned by users. Less than 16% of iPhones worldwide have installed the new version of the system according to the study. Figures very far from those recorded last year for iOS 18 at the same period.
The report notably justified this false figure by accusing the Liquid Glass graphic redesign, which would be considered too intrusive by some users. A counter-investigation published by Lapcat Software developer Jeff Johnson now reveals that this data was simply wrong.
A flaw in Safari distorted all the figures
It all started with the launch of iOS 26 and a discreet change in Safari, Apple’s browser. The latter stopped clearly indicating the version of iOS used in the “user agent”, technical information transmitted to websites to identify the device and its system.
This anomaly, voluntary according to Appleprevents tools like StatCounter from distinguishing iOS 26 from earlier versions when a site is viewed with Safari. On the other hand, Chrome and Firefox on iPhone continue to show exact versionwhich distorts comparisons.
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This effectively means that if you have updated your iPhone to iOS 26 but are only using Safari, your device is counted as still running iOS 18 or another version. This is what Jeff Johnson was able to demonstrate by analyzing the technical headers of his own site, where only third-party browsers clearly displayed an “iOS 26” system. This explains why the numbers seemed so low, despite millions of devices already up to date.
An error repeated everywhere
Many articles have relayed StatCounter figures without questioning their reliability. We took them back too, before the error was identified. Some even reinforced this reading by adding statistics from their own audience. You may have read that nearly 75% of users ignored iOS 26, a conclusion that is now probably false.
Some were also not fooled, like the journalists from AppleInsider, who spotted this inconsistency in their own statistics. They therefore preferred to delay their publication, while waiting for more evidence.
There could therefore be many more of you using iOS 26 than the study predicts. We will probably have to wait for official figures from Apple, expected by the end of January, to obtain a more reliable overview of the situation.
By: Keleops AG
