Tim Cook’s last day as Apple CEO arrived on August 31, 2026, ending a run that began when Steve Jobs resigned in 2011. He led the company for about 15 years. John Ternus, the senior vice president of hardware engineering, takes over as chief executive on September 1. Cook announced the plan in April. He does not leave the company. Instead, he moves into the role of Apple executive chairman, where he will manage relationships with governments and policymakers around the world.
The move counts as a rare kind of exit for a company this size. Apple set the date months ahead. That timing matters. Sudden departures tend to unsettle markets, while a planned Apple CEO transition gives large shareholders room to price in the change.
How Tim Cook’s Apple tenure reshaped the company
Cook joined Apple in 1998 after Jobs met him and asked him to run worldwide operations. He became chief executive in August 2011, six weeks before Jobs died. Over Tim Cook’s tenure, the company grew from a business built on a few product cycles into a wider consumer technology operation. New categories arrived under his watch. The Apple Watch, Apple Pay, AirPods and Apple TV+ each launched during these years. Services revenue climbed past $100 billion, second only to the iPhone.
The financial record is direct. Apple became the first publicly traded U.S. company to reach a $1 trillion market cap. It passed $2 trillion in 2020 and crossed $3 trillion for the first time in 2022. The company reached $4 trillion in October 2025. Apple’s market cap now sits near $4.6 trillion, second behind Nvidia.
What Tim Cook’s last day as Apple CEO means for Ternus
Tim Cook gave a firm start date to his successor. John Ternus, the new Apple CEO as of September 1, brings a hardware background. He joined Apple in 2001 on the product design team and moved up to lead hardware engineering in 2021. Cook called him the right person to lead the company next. The question now is whether Ternus can keep the growth going while Apple works to catch up in artificial intelligence, the field where software learns patterns from data to answer questions or complete tasks.
Apple has moved slower than some rivals on that front. Ternus inherits strong finances and a loyal customer base, along with pressure to show progress on Apple Intelligence and Siri. Reports point to a foldable iPhone as one of the first big products of his era, along with plans for smart glasses. His first months will test whether the operating model Cook built can pair with sharper product engineering.
A quiet exit, on his terms
Cook framed the day with restraint. In a memo to staff, he said he was stepping away from a role he had loved deeply, and that he felt at peace with the decision. He keeps a seat close to the company. As executive chairman, Cook will steer Apple’s ties with President Trump and the Chinese government, work that shaped supply chains across his years in charge. Tim Cook closes one chapter, and the handover opens the next test for the world’s second most valuable company.
