Foreflight Discontinuing Operating System Support for Older Apple Products

[1980Mooney]

5 hours ago, midlifeflyer said:

 I couldn't resist trying so I installed Foreflight in an old iPhone 5s that was lying in a drawer. iOS 12.5.5. Foreflight 12.9.2. 

OMG! there's an iOS update to 12.5.7. Think it's safe?

You should start using it to find out! If you start getting emails asking for your credit card to invest in "spectacular" time-share opportunities in North Korea, then you will know for sure........

[Schllc]

6 hours ago, Vance Harral said:

And, uh... stay off my lawn too!

While I don’t pretend to understand the nuances I get the gist. 
But why move obviously well known and used features of the base OS?
like where your mail accounts are located?  
I know of no one asking for this, and most are as frustrated as I am, albeit not as long…    
It feels like they are either randomly disorganizing them, or they are trying to alter your behavior on the device.  
We are the product…

 

[Vance Harral]

2 hours ago, Schllc said:

But why move obviously well known and used features of the base OS?
like where your mail accounts are located?  
I know of no one asking for this, and most are as frustrated as I am, albeit not as long…    
It feels like they are either randomly disorganizing them, or they are trying to alter your behavior on the device.  
We are the product…

In most cases it's a lot less Orwellian.  The industry is just full of engineers who both want to "do something", and are also convinced they're some of the smartest guys in the room.  They're often led by managers who are willing to let them try things, because that's how you learn.  In some cases you learn not to touch stuff, but to be fair it's also how you learn to maintain stuff when it breaks due to underlying changes in the hardware, O/S, or whatever.  I've been both the developer and the manager in my career, and even having seen what I've seen, it's still challenging to leave things alone.

It's also very tough to recruit for a team with a mission statement like, "Please maintain this existing, well-loved software, exactly like it is", so efforts to do so often cause the app to fall below critical support mass.  Combine that with the nature of most engineers to (1) tinker; and (2) be introverted enough to avoid asking others' opinions about what's best, and you wind up stacking the deck against simply letting good things stay status quo.

[MikeOH]

^^^ BINGO ^^^

[midlifeflyer]

9 hours ago, 1980Mooney said:

You should start using it to find out! If you start getting emails asking for your credit card to invest in "spectacular" time-share opportunities in North Korea, then you will know for sure........

Heck, i  been getting those for years!

[takair]

I suspect this is more about a new business model.  I was sent a link to a Facebook post from an employee that the new owners of Foreflight just laid off a significant portion of the work force.  I suspect the majority are software, so not having to maintain multiple compatabilites would fit with having fewer people to support that.  As it is, the only reason I updated my iPad mini was because of Foreflight not working well on the older one.  This will mean even more frequent forced hardware updates when the iPad hits the Apple threshold.  

[Fly Boomer]

15 hours ago, Vance Harral said:

Combine that with the nature of most engineers to (1) tinker; and (2) be introverted enough to avoid asking others' opinions about what's best, and you wind up stacking the deck against simply letting good things stay status quo.

I saw this a bunch of times with a crew of 20-somethings who all wanted to leave their mark but were so focused on some localized behavior of the code, they missed the bigger picture.  This is especially true when the code is not the best in the first place, but it works.  It's the law of unintended consequenses.

[1980Mooney]

4 hours ago, takair said:

I suspect this is more about a new business model.  I was sent a link to a Facebook post from an employee that the new owners of Foreflight just laid off a significant portion of the work force.  I suspect the majority are software, so not having to maintain multiple compatabilites would fit with having fewer people to support that.  

Not necessarily. More likely that they are laying off software engineers because they using more efficient AI coding tools. 
 

https://webdesignerdepot.com/the-death-of-coding-jobs-how-ai-no-code-and-corporate-greed-are-killing-the-industry/
 

[Ragsf15e]

On 1/14/2026 at 12:58 PM, midlifeflyer said:

The security issues tend to be on the iOS end and even my old iPhone 7 gets those. In the case of the app, it's more likely to be features which take advantage of the capabilities of the new OS and the environment in which it's found. 

 

 I couldn't resist trying so I installed Foreflight in an old iPhone 5s that was lying in a drawer. iOS 12.5.5. Foreflight 12.9.2. 

OMG! there's an iOS update to 12.5.7. Think it's safe?

I think you’ll be safe!  This is the status of the mini ipad 2 I use regularly for FF!

[PeteMc]

2 hours ago, 1980Mooney said:

Not necessarily. More likely that they are laying off software engineers because they using more efficient AI coding tools. 

Good point.  This very well may be a big part of it. 

[midlifeflyer]

1 hour ago, Ragsf15e said:

I think you’ll be safe!  This is the status of the mini ipad 2 I use regularly for FF!

 

I feel much better now. 

[takair]

2 hours ago, Ragsf15e said:

I think you’ll be safe!  This is the status of the mini ipad 2 I use regularly for FF!

Wow, I gave up on my Mini 2, 2 iPads ago because i couldn’t get features to work.  That’s impressive…