[gehsty]

My understanding is that In any connector there are contacts and pins, the pins move a little each time the connector is engaged and disengaged making the pins eventually fail (or they could become damaged). In lightning connections the pins are on the phone, contacts on the cable, making the phone a potential failure point. In usb c the pins are in the cable, the contacts are in the phone, making the most vulnerable part of the connection in the easily replaceable cable (not the expensive to repair phone)…

[AnonC]

I don’t know if it’s this difference in structure that makes it so or not, but what I’ve found with USB-C cables (very limited experience on my part compared to lightning cables) to be more flimsy. Somehow it seems to wiggle more or is loose to connect well and the fit isn’t right sometimes. It’s tough to use such a cable when charging something like an Apple TV remote where there’s no display to show charging status.

[a_humean]

Why would apple choose to do that, surely that just increases their repairs costs bill? Is the cynical answer that it will fail well past warrenty in most cases, so prompting the consumer to upgrade because their phone has worn out?

There must be a more charitable explaination.

[evgen]

The more charitable explanation is that the pins for the lightning connectors really do not wear out. This complaint is a made-up problem and in the real world it does not actually happen any more than someone accidentally jamming something into the usb-c port and breaking the center connector. Lighting ports do have one problem usb-c lacks: they collect a bit of pocket lint that can impact connections and eventually needs to be scraped out using the sim ejector tool (or a paperclip.)

[jtbayly]

True about lint in lightning ports, but not entirely true it doesn’t happen in USBC. Probably less common, but I know somebody who had to get some saw dust out of a usb-c port.

[satiric]

USB-C also has the lint problem, at least for me.

[philistine]

It's more difficult to design and build pins for longevity in a cable? I think the logic with Lightning is that Apple can build a very structurally sound connector with pins inside the phone. After all, we have seen few issues with pins in phones failing.