Interesting. I find articles that confirm your experience, followed with "But it's a good practice to plug in the phone..." I've know I've had updates stuck. *sigh*
There is a new critical update to iOS this week. Also, iOS 16 has been released and I installed that on my phone. I like that in messages, there is now a "recently deleted" option so that messages don't permanently disappear when deleted. Now they are handled like deleted email and are still available for 30 days. Several other "features" have updates, too.
I installed iOS 16 on my phone a while back, and on the 24th, Apple released the new iPad OS 16, so I updated everything else on Monday last week. I am not seeing any new release since the 16.1 update. Are you on something different from that, @Beth Gallagher ?
I have 15.7.1 but it tells me my software is up to date. I hadn't noticed it on the iPhone because I have only one of them, but I have noticed that my Mini Mac and my MacBook Pro don't update on the same day, although they both use macOS. It might be that Apple doesn't want everyone downloading it at the same time.
You should have updates for everything, @Ken Anderson . My kids all have either a Mac computer or a MacBook (or both), as well as phones and ipads, and they were busy updating last Monday as well. The phones updated a week or two before that. Check again and see if there is not something that says you can update.
My Macs updated a few days ago, although not on the same day. My phone says that it is updated at 15.7.1, as I said.
I think my phone said the same thing, but I could scroll down a bit on that screen and see an "option" to install 16.1. Not sure when the "auto update" would have run because I manually updated it.
I noticed some changes in the messaging feature, and some more functions with photos. I don't use a lot of "options" so most changes don't register with me. I'm more interested in security patches than options.
15.7.1 upgrade was waiting for me to take action (what does Apple think "Automatic" means?) so I made the leap to 16.1 and then upgraded my watch. Funny, when I did the upgrade prior to 15.7.1 and 16.1 was shown as optional, my watch still said there was an upgrade to be done before it could be upgraded. Maybe it was waiting for 16.1, or somehow it knew 15.7.1 was on the runway before my phone knew it.
Since I don't pay a lot of attention to the numbers, I can't say for sure but, although I have both my computers and my phone set for automatic updates, it seems to me like I always have to initiate them. With my computers, that could be because I shut them off when I'm not using them but I never shut my phone off. I ignore it a lot, but I don't shut it off. My Mini Mac and my MacBook Pro do automatically update applications, but I have to tell it to update the OS.
The Russians just released some messages allegedly from the past British PMs I-Phone indicating that the Brits were responsible for the pipeline explosion in collusion with the U.S. I wonder if she had the updates? Russia claimed they hacked her phone. I guess you take it as you will whether it is true.