- watchOS 11 drops support for Apple Watch Series 4 (2018), Apple Watch Series 5 (2019), and Apple Watch SE 1 (2020).
- Until now, the company had been dropping one or two Apple Watch models every other year.
- The Apple Watch Series 5 and Apple Watch SE 1 share the same S5 chip, which explains the joint retirement.
iPhones and many years of software support go hand in hand. While Apple has pledged to keep the latest iPhones up to date for at least five years, it often updates them beyond that mark. The same can’t be said about Apple Watches, however. The company hasn’t committed to a specific number of support years, and its patterns aren’t always predictable. In a move that has shocked many, the Apple Watch Series 4 (2018), Series 5 (2019), and SE 1 (2020) won’t support watchOS 11.
Since the same S5 chipset powers the Apple Watch Series 5 and SE 1, retiring them simultaneously makes technological sense. Nevertheless, until now, the company had never dropped support for three Apple Watch models at once. In the past, the company had been retiring one to two models every other year, as our breakdown below reflects: