iOS is moving into adulthood. The mobile operating system has grown a large amount of features with each iteration, but iOS 9 will see Apple spend more time on improving the stability of the platform and less time on rolling out more features.
The rapid and successive release of fractional updates to iOS 8 finally started to strain the mobile OS' backbone, Apple loyalists. Details of the apparent leak of iOS' future came from Apple watchers 9to5 Mac.
Due at some point in 2015, iOS 9, code-named "Monarch," will be the first of the mobile OS' annualized releases to give preference to stability and there are a number or reasons why. As mentioned earlier, bolstering customer satisfaction is a major reason to focus on iOS 9's performance.
Customer Patience
iOS 8 stumbled out of the gates and so did each of the patches meant to address the OS' myriad bugs. Users of legacy Apple devices almost immediately started to complain about iOS 8's responsiveness, while the iPhone 6 series suffered from bugs that disrupted service and some even suffered from blanked screens.
Shortly after the stalled launch of the brand-spanking new HealthKit, iOS 8.0.1 was pulled back into the garage alongside the health platform for repairs.
All of the bugs patched and "punted," delaying issues, to be fixed in future updates resulted in iOS 8 being called the mobile OS' buggiest release to date. Customer's disgust of those bugs is undoubtedly prompting Apple to focus on keeping its fans happy, rather than another year of incremental gains instability and postponing bugs.
Apple Pay
Growing into a solid stream of revenue, Apple Pay can't afford to move into another house filled with bugs. The public is still getting used to the idea of conducting everyday transactions with their mobile devices, so a bugged iOS 9 could shake consumer confidence in the platform's security and it could flat out just discourage customers from using the virtual wallet.
Apple Pay thrived despite faltering with double charges and verification failures, so it makes sense for Apple to go after a Snow Leopard-like release with iOS 9.
The Apple Watch
Apple is finally entering the smartwatch market, but the release of the Apple Watch is expected to occur before the launch of iOS 9. While the ninth iteration of iOS won't be fundamentally different than the eighth, Apple likely doesn't want developers expressing timidity in porting their Watch apps to its latest mobile OS on fears of bug infestation.
In Time
The details about iOS 9 should continue leaking through up until Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in June, when the company will likely talk about the mobile OS at length.
