Charge of the Lightning brigade

The iPhone 15 has arrived with a big change that is sure to annoy many. Allow me to unpack that. To comply with EU regulations, this one will abandon the Lightning connector that has been the method for charging iPhones for 11 years. In its place will be a different oval-shaped connector: USB-C.

When people buy their next iPhones, they will no longer be able to plug in all the Lightning accessories they have — charging cables, speaker docks and earbuds. They will have to replace those with new products that use USB-C connectors to plug into the new iPhones.

In 2012, Apple killed the relatively bulky 30-pin connector on iPhones to switch to Lightning, which rendered many speakers and chargers obsolete.