It's 19 years since the iPhone came out, that's almost two decades. 19 years before the iPhone was 1988. Things from 1988 definitely seemed dated in 2007. In fact I think style/aesthetics change is now getting slower and slower. Anything within the last 10 years looks like it could have been made today, since the image resolution / quality doesn't significantly change in such an obvious way. Throughout the 90s and 00s, it felt like things were constantly changing year to year. Totally different mindblowing graphics in games in each release, new OS features, digital cameras, cell phones (at all), then color screens on dumbphones, PDA, smartphone etc. etc., any Internet at all, then broadband etc. It subjectively felt much more rapid than today. The only exception is AI today, but even that is a different feel.

It looked old when it was fresh already.

When it comes to iPhones, iPhone 4 and iOS 7 were the first ones that looked modern and pleasant (don't confuse aesthetics with UX though).

iOS 7 really changed the game on the iOS aesthetic. We probably would've had more refined skeuomorphism had that re-design not been as aggressive as it was.

It seems our fingers have gotten thinner, or more skillful at tapping at relatively tinier buttons now. Look at how huge those buttons are.

I am aware screen size has increased tremendously, even then I think the buttons were still quite huge compared to the size of today's tappable links.

Yeah in comparison OSX Mountain Lion or Windows 8 look basically the same as the modern desktop OSes, while mobile releases from that era look totally different. I suppose it had only been 5 years since the release of the iPhone so there was still a lot of experimentation

It looks better with actual buttons that are easy to read and tap.