Tim Cook has now been Apple’s Chief Executive Office (CEO) for a longer time than Steve Jobs‘ entire tenure, including his time as interim CEO.
Steve Jobs served first as interim CEO from September 16, 1997 to January 5, 2000 (841 days), and then as official CEO from January 5, 2000 until his resignation on August 24, 2011 (4,249 days). All combined, he was Apple CEO for a total of 5,090 days.
Tim Cook became CEO immediately following Jobs’s resignation on August 24, 2011 and has held the position continuously since then, amounting to 5,091 days. As of today, August 1, 2025, Cook has officially been Apple’s CEO for a single day longer than Steve Jobs was.
Steve Jobs was not Apple’s first CEO. When Apple incorporated in 1977, venture capitalist Mike Markkula insisted on having an experienced executive run the fledgling company, and Michael Scott was hired as Apple’s first CEO. When Scott departed, Markkula himself became CEO. Jobs then personally recruited former Pepsi executive John Sculley in 1983.
Meanwhile, Jobs held other titles in the company, including chairman of the board and head of the Macintosh division, but he did not hold the chief executive role. A 1985 power struggle saw Jobs was stripped of his responsibilities and he left the company.
Jobs tenure as CEO saw the launch of several major products, including the iPod, iMac, MacBook Air and MacBook Pro, the iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV. As for Cook, his reign has included the debut of the Apple Watch, AirPods, HomePod, Apple silicon, AirTag, and Vision Pro.
On the software side of things, Jobs oversaw the debut of Mac OS X, iTunes, iOS, Safari, the App Store, iCloud, and FaceTime. Cook’s time at the top has seen the launch of Apple Pay, Swift, Apple Pay, and Apple Intelligence. Cook has also overseen a big expansion in the services it offers, including Apple Music, the Apple TV+ streaming service, Apple Arcade, Apple Fitness+, and Apple News+.
Jobs also pulled the company back from the brink of extinction, getting a $150 million investment from Microsoft, moving the company into retail, and planning Apple Park. Jobs laid the foundation of today’s Apple, which is the most valuable American technology firm. Under Cook, Apple has become the most valuable U.S. tech company, with its supervised record valuations reaching $3 trillion dollars in 2022. Cook has also oversaw significant acquisitions, including Beats and Shazam.
While there have been some rumblings from analysts that Apple may need to consider a new CEO, we shouldn’t expect to see Cook step down from his CEO role anytime soon. As pointed out by Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, there are no immediate successors on the horizon. Plus, Cook doesn’t appear to be ready to step down and hasn’t shown any willingness to groom a successor.
Gurman says the Apple board seems content to keep having Cook pilot the company’s direction. Apple’s board of directors includes several Cook loyalists, such as Susan Wagner, Ronald Sugar, and Arthur Levinson.
Gurman believes Cook could even further tighten his grip on Apple’s reins, as he could also take over the role of Chairman, as Apple’s current Chairman, Levinson has already passed the company’s recommended board retirement age. Levinson could retire and Cook could slip into the Chairman role. This has happened at other tech firms, as Cisco Systems Inc.’s Chuck Robbins, as well as Microsoft Corp.’s Satya Nadella have both made that move at their companies.
