Cables are the obvious one, as someone else mentioned. But I think people forget how many accessories have been sold (e.g. FLIR cameras [0]) that were Lightning only. Switching the phone to USB-C renders those expensive accessories obsolete.
I have a Lightning FLIR camera and it works identically well when used with Apple’s Lightning-to-USB-C adapter, it even works with my 2018 iPad Pro which kicked-off the iOS+USB-C process all those years ago.
My iPhone today is rather aged (and uses Lightning) so I’m switching to an iPhone 16 later this year, and I’m confident all of my Lightning accessories will continue to work do long as the apps are available on iTunes.
Related question: now that desktop iTunes is useless for iPhone app management - how the heck do I save and load the iOS I’ve purchased after they’ve been pulled from the store?
Yup, exactly. I have a flir one, and I’ll have to keep my old lightning iPhone around just so I can use the flir camera when I need it. There are probably a bunch of such peripherals. The key difference between MacBooks and iPads where they did switch to USB-C early is that dongles are WAY less convenient of a workaround with a mobile peripheral.
I think the lifetime of the lightning connector has been very reasonable. If they switched much earlier they would’ve really screwed over those who invested in lightning peripherals. I think it’s reasonable to expect the peripherals to last at least one phone upgrade.
Yeah maybe it still sucks for people who bought such peripherals in the last few years. But more and more stuff is done over Bluetooth now and we’ve had years where everyone should know that there wasn’t a future for lightning
[0] https://www.flir.com/products/flir-one-gen-3