I think people are forgetting how extremely unpolished the iPhone was out of the gate. No app store. Even something as fundamental as copy/paste took until years later.
You’re talking about features. It didn’t have that many, sure.
But the features it did have were extremely well polished.
Part of the reason it took them forever to add copy/paste is because Android phones had 12 different ways to do it and it was unintuitive as a result. I’m not suggesting Apple’s solution is better; but it’s definitely intentional and thought-through.
At the time, Apple was one of the very few companies with really intentional design. Now many companies have adopted that philosophy.
There's a difference between polished and feature-rich. I'd actually argue the iPhone was more "polished" before they introduced the app store—their vision was pure.
I think people are forgetting how extremely unpolished the iPhone was out of the gate. No app store. Even something as fundamental as copy/paste took until years later.