[actionscripted]

As I understand it you generally have 5 years for hardware and software support with software requiring that you upgrade to major versions as they're released for continued updates. Perhaps someone can share a link or provide better details for software support/EOL info?

Here's their vintage/obsolete products info page: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201624

[gregknicholson]

As an ordinary consumer using my phone, how would I know when it's going to become unmaintained and I'll need to buy a new phone (if I want to continue having security maintenance)?

This is one thing I think Linux distros could do better: not just advertising upgrades to the next release, but warning when the current release is (soon to be) no longer maintained.