Exactly when will Apple unveil the iPhone 16 series, launch pre-orders and put them on sale? You can read my full details of all these steps here, and now an industry heavyweight has set out what they think Apple’s thinking is, and when the phones will be announced. It’s a surprising theory.
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Good news is, it doesn’t differ greatly from my suggested dates, but it introduces a new idea as to Apple’s strategy.
Apple has made clear that Apple Intelligence will be a big selling point for the next iPhone series. Trouble is, it looks like it won’t be ready for Apple’s preferred September release date. So, what is Apple going to do? Push back the release so the marquee feature will launch with the iPhone 16 series? Not according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman in his latest Power On newsletter.
Instead, Gurman says, Apple has taken a radically different approach this time around, compared to 2011, when it was about to launch the iPhone 4s. “The rationale: iCloud and Siri—a pair of new online services—wouldn’t be ready until the fall. Other than those enhancements, the iPhone 4S wouldn’t have a lot of fresh features. So rather than launch the iPhone 4S in June and give people Siri and iCloud via software upgrades a few months later, it decided to hold off and launch everything together at the end of the year,” Gurman says.
Since then, September has been Apple’s favorite for iPhone launches. But this year, it has a similar problem as Apple Intelligence “won’t be ready until October.” But, it’s not going to delay the release of the phones. “Apple is taking a different tack and won’t hold back the new hardware until the services are ready,” says Gurman.
So, when does that leave the release? My guess was that the announcement would take place on Tuesday, September 10, with onsale date of Friday, September 20.
Gurman says, “I’m told that the iPhone launch will occur around the same time as last year — a quick look at the calendar makes Sept. 10 a probable date — and users will need to upgrade their new hardware to iOS 18.1 in October to get rolling with Apple Intelligence.”
Gurman is slightly cautious in his prediction: I’ll go further, I’m sure that Tuesday, September 10 is the day of the reveal. Things could still change, but I’d take a bet on this.