It used to be that a new phone came with a relatively substantial new feature set. People have become accustomed to this and businesses have been built around this. At this point, it’s mostly about consumerism.
I’m still rocking an iPhone 12 Mini without the slightest hiccup as well as an original iPhone SE as my main music player. I used to be the person who got every new phone because there used to be such a jump in performance and hardware features. Now I have no reason to upgrade at all. Honestly, I’d love to get rid of my phone all together and just use an iPad, Apple Watch, and my camera and journal.