The iPhone may get even bigger next year, according to new rumors
Mar 5, 2018, 4:09 AM
(Flickr/Hamza Butt)
(Flickr/Hamza Butt)
Sources familiar with Apple products told Bloomberg this week that Apple plans to launch three new smartphones later this year.
One will be the largest iPhone yet, while the other two will be an upgraded model about the size of the iPhone X and a less expensive phone.
Apple hopes the new big model will appeal to audiences who want the large phone devices (which are often called “phablets” for phone-tablets) and to those who want a less expensive iPhone X, according to Bloomberg.
Apple will reportedly announce these plans in the fall. Plans can still change, of course.
Apple essentially wants to offer new models for all customers.
“This is a big deal,” Gene Munster, a co-founder of Loup Ventures and a long-time Apple watcher, told Bloomberg. “When you have a measurable upgrade in screen size, people go to update their phone in droves. We saw that with the iPhone 6, and we think this is setting up to be a similar step up in growth.”
Apple’s iPhone X device didn’t sell as well as expected this past fall. The iPhone X accounted for 20 percent of all U.S. iPhone sales in the fourth quarter of 2017.
Although those numbers toppled the sales numbers for the iPhone 8 Plus (which earned 17 percent of all iPhone sales), they were behind the iPhone 8’s success, which accounted for 20 percent of all iPhone sales worldwide in 2017, according to a report from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners.
Acclaimed KGI Securities’ analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said the iPhone X would likely be canceled due to the lower sales numbers.
At the same time, rumors flourished in January that Apple will be launching the iPhone SE — the inexpensive version — with new features to appeal to Apple consumers who don’t want to spend a lot of money.
Apple rumors of new, bigger phones come just hours after Samsung unveiled its latest device, the Samsung Galaxy S9, at a crowded press event in Barcelona.
USA Today reported that the new device touts a better camera, super slow motion and the company’s answer to the iPhone animated emojis.
Samsung also appears to be doubling down on virtual and assisted reality.
