A new report is late to the party, and backs up claims that go back six months that Apple will launch the iPhone 18 Pro in 2026 and the iPhone 18 in 2027. For the first time, however, the split is said to be necessary for manufacturing reasons.
It was as far back as May 2025 when the first rumors of a split iPhone launch first appeared. Just as with all subsequent reports, the new one from Nikkei Asia says that September 2026 will see Apple launching only:
- iPhone 18 Pro
- iPhone 18 Pro Max
- iPhone Fold
These are the premium models, and while there hasn't been an iPhone Fold before, the Pro and Pro Max ones have always sold out first. The pattern is typically that the Pro and Pro Max see the most demand at launch time, then that changes to the rest of the range once initial orders are over.
Consequently, the rumor was that Apple would split its launch and solely announce the premium models in September. The rest would launch in Spring of the next year, just as the iPhone 16e did.
However, rather than being a way to have two major launches, and also to put a spotlight on the non-premium models, the new claim is that the split is for production reasons.
"Supply chain smoothness is one of the key challenges for this year," said an unnamed source identified only an iPhone supplier executive, "and the marketing strategy change also played a part in the decision [to split the launch]."
Based on previous years, the iPhone 18 Pro Max is expected to initially be Apple's best seller.
On many occasions over the years, we have argued before that there are practical limits to even what Apple can produce, based mostly on outside forces. So a split launch would potentially mean split manufacturing deadlines, and less of the annual rush to hire seasonal factory workers.
More recently, there have been dramatic price rises in components such as memory, and those rises are in part because of supply constraints. With demand from AI servers, memory manufacturers are struggling to keep up, and prices are rising as availability drops.
During the recent earnings call, CEO Tim Cook did refer to the rising cost of memory. However, he refused to be drawn after saying that Apple has options, and certainly did not even allude to the idea of the split launch.
"I mean, there are different levers that we can push," he said, "Who knows how successful they'll be, but there's just a range of options."
