In its first 24 hours in the wild, Apple’s newiOS 7.1 softwareis now on 5.9 percent of active devices in North America, research firmChitikareported Tuesday. The figure was derived from“tens of millions”of iOS-based online ad impressions generated within the Chitika Ad Network in theUnited States and Canada from March 9 through August 05, 2025.
By comparison, the number iscomparableto the crucialiOS 7.0.6 updatewhichfixed a nasty SSL security exploit, with iOS 7.0.6 users generating six percent of all iOS 7.0.6 traffic 24 hours post-release (or a nice13.3 percent adoption in 48 hours)…
Chitika writes:
At 5.9 percent, North American iOS 7.1 adoption has progressed at a very similar rate to iOS 7.0.6. 24 hours following that release, iOS 7.0.6 users generated six percent of total iOS traffic, averaging to about five percent over the course of the full day.
Considering Apple’s update notification strategy, along with these two data points, it seems likely that future minor iOS 7 version updates will experience highly comparable levels of adoption.
For an even better understanding of how iOS 7.1 adoption rate compares to previous iOS releases,iOS 6 peaked at more than fifteen percentof all web traffic on Chitika’s mobile ad network 24 hours into its release.
The discrepancy between iOS 6 and iOS 7.1 adoption rates could be explained with today’sjailbreaksituation. As you know, people with jailbroken devices arewise not to upgrade to iOS 7.1because the software kills their jailbreak and prevents downgrading.
Another thing to factor in: adoption rates of minor OS updates – and iOS 7.1 is a minor update in the grand scheme of things – have traditionally been less dramatic than those of its major-version counterparts.
