John Ternus to become Apple CEO

I'm really hopeful about John Ternus stepping into the CEO role. Pretty much everything he's done leading Apple's hardware engineering has been an enormous unqualified success, and for a company like Apple, having hardware lead the company seems like the right step.

Any chance of a future where hardware can be customized at the design stage, like 3D printing but taken to an even higher level, even for 1-off builds? So prompt-driven manufacturing? For example, a watch with a USB-C port?

One day that watch could be your only PC. And then some type of eyeglass for a screen. Can also do "terrain overlays" Terminator style. I suppose battery power is the bottleneck so maybe long-distance wireless power delivery is the key (as what Tesla originally created.) So no battery at all.

situations like this should allow for relaxing the title rules to "unbury" the lede.

So John gets to announce the Fold comes september

How long to the next ATP podcast?

Mister Ternus, please create an Apple TV.

It will redefine the way we watch TV and that's exactly your job, to make something truly unique. And I'll tell you the secret sauce, the remote. I know you'll come up with something totally different, a marvel of engineering that will drop jaws around the world. Different aluminum colors and extra flat? Check. But that's not what this new generation needs. They want to watch tiktok and instagram in their TV and nobody right now offers an out-of-this-world experience. Social media consumption on a big screen. Excel at that and you will sell millions at whatever price you set.

My credit card is ready...

It's exciting to see that the new CEO of Apple is a hardware guy.

I was just thinking about what had been avoiding enshittification, and Apple's hardware was the only thing I came up. All other stuff, all products from Google, MS, Facebook, Twitter, and even Nvidia though the performance was improved has gone downhill. It's not only tech companies, but fast food, car manufacturers, real estate, and many others, if it wasn't shit from the start like consulting, healthcare, and marketing.

They have flaws, like not allowing users to repair the hardware, but well, at least it's consistent.

I really hope Apple (hardware at least) will remain free from enshittification.

John Ternus is the perfect choice. I expected Craig, and that would've been great, but Ternus is going to really be something special in that role!

Apple hardware has been a shining light for Apple for the past 5-10 years, even if a bit lucky. I’m curious how this effects the company as a whole going forward, hopefully positive

Apple is good at hardware, they need help with software. I hope putting a hardware guy in charge can still improve this situation.

Please, do not make the products any thicker!

This would not be on The Successor

Anyone else notice the header text gets cut off on mobile? On an iPhone 17 no less...

Can not believe no one has asked the obvious question - is his nickname Tina ?

Pretty simple hot take:

This period in Apple’s history will be the cold ice bath post Jobs.

There may be serious fanboy energy to this but Apple has so much dry powder going for it still, and to put that in the hands of someone who actually builds, along with what looks to be a strong rumor mill year with VR stuff and the foldable to create a big tailwind… it seems like a pretty intentional move.

Also if they dropped one more subscription on us before expanding categories they might’ve caused an avalanche in lack of confidence.

Cook did an excellent job of raking in cash for bet the company size bets that he wouldn’t be guaranteed to see through. The dude is clearly a salt of the earth, values guy, should enjoy a proper retirement era.

I know the rumors were swirling for the past few months, but just 4 more months of Cook seems like pretty short notice, no?

Craig Federighi should also resign. The software is getting worse and disoriented. Since Apple pre-records the events, Craig only cares about how to look cool in front of Developers rather than grooming the software for Apple.

If Johny Ive stayed, he could have become CEO... Now he has to design Ferrari dashboards and AI Pins

China is effectively run by engineers, so that is a good hedge for Apple.

About time. Hopefully we can see some meaningful hardware improvements in the coming years.

I believe his name is Tim Apple

wow… I didn’t expect this. My guess would have been after the current administration.

Why so soon?

Will it change Apple's extreme bend into lock-in for the better?

Maybe Mac Mini M5 this year?

Wonder how much of this decision has to do with the current climate and not wanting to deal with the current head. I was quite disappointed to see cook towing the line and bending the knee, let’s see what Ternus will do

Tim Cook will be one of the legendary CEOs in history.

he knows when to be conservative - and knows when to push hard.

qualities very few CEOs have shown to have in practice.

all his contemporary competitors have ridden on certain waves e.g A.I to increase company valuation - while he did sorely on just pure operations not hype.

I hope they will turn Siri around with these changes.

Anyone know why?

Tim gifted Donald a trophy 8 months ago doing his legacy no favors. You wouldn't do this if you knew you were on your way out. Makes me wonder if something happened between August 2025 and now.

Will this change their AI strategy (or lack of)

Do.you.think.he’ll.fix.the.usability.issues?

I always thought Craig would become CEO.

RIP Tim, the best derivative by the book uninspired machine to ever do it.

Yeah glad to see a hardware person take the helm and not a bean counter. The hardware is masterful now. Let’s keep it that way. Wonder if he kills the Vision Pro.

Why is the photo so blurry?

Suggest changing the title to include both parts, if they fit: "Tim Cook to become Apple Executive Chairman, John Ternus to become Apple CEO"

Sad to see Tim Cook leaving as I was enjoying this downtrend of Apple products that is driving users to more open (and better) solutions like Linux PCs. I cross fingers for John Ternus to still be greedy and not being too competent.

can't believe craige is not the ceo

So, John Apple?

Good riddance to an effective CEO whose entire legacy will be tarnished by a giant, gold-plated asterisk.

I wish Apple would lean into gaming and create a competitive GPU system. Does not have to compete with a 5090, but 5070 level and game developers will come and port games. Huge untapped market. I still have to run a dedicated gaming PC just to play games (especially Flight Simulator).

The NYT was right: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/technology/apple-ceo-tim-...

Tim saw the ram shortage and said, "WTF am I suppose to do with this? I'm out of here!" Better leave a hero ...

Maybe MAC mini M5

Surprised that someone from Gen X is getting the opportunity to lead a company of this caliber. We've spent most of our adult lives getting smothered by Boomers and Millennials.

Thanks for making all that money, Tim. Now please retire. Please.

@dang can we fix this to mention John Ternus becoming CEO

My personal hope for John Ternus is that he relaxes some of Apple's anti-competitive bullshit to the point where the company is willing to make iPads actually useful for anything other than 2D drawing apps. As someone who has been daily-driving an M1 iPad Pro for five years, the iPad is the most glaring hole in Apple's lineup in terms of usefulness.

Yes, I get that the iPad is supposed to be a "casual computing device" or whatever. Yes, I know Apple has delivered significant improvements to iPadOS's capabilities in those five years. But using it still feels like wearing a straitjacket a lot of the time.