One other report has surfaced claiming that Apple might be shaking issues up on the subject of its iPhone launch schedule. Because it stands, Apple releases its whole lineup mid-September yearly, and that’s actually what we’ll expect the place the iPhone 17 is worried.
Sure, there was an occasional handset launch within the spring. Typically there’s a brand new color variant, as with the alpine inexperienced iPhone 13 Professional or the purple iPhone 12, generally a finances mannequin, the newest being the iPhone 16e. However this is able to be a way more vital launch, signalling a giant shift within the Apple schedule.
Based on a report within the Korean newspaper ET-news, which was noticed by MacRumors, the bottom iPhone 18 mannequin gained’t make its debut in 2026. As an alternative it – and an reasonably priced (by Apple’s requirements, at the least) iPhone 18e – will seem within the spring of 2027, some six months later.

Chris Martin / Foundry
At this stage, it is nonetheless a hearsay however this isn’t the primary time we’ve heard a staggered launch technique talked about the place future Apple telephones are involved. The Verge reported on it again in Could. And it does make sense if it’s additionally true that Apple might be launching its first foldable subsequent 12 months.
Business sources anticipate Apple’s inaugural book-style foldable to debut as a part of the iPhone 18 lineup. If that’s the case, Apple might not need to dump the entire sequence of iPhones onto the market directly. The model may nicely have have six variants of 1 era obtainable: iPhone 18, iPhone 18 Air, iPhone 18e, iPhone 18 Professional, iPhone 18 Professional Max and iPhone 18 Fold.
As an alternative, the September occasion will showcase the high-end fashions, with the cheaper (once more, that is relative) fashions obtainable in a while. This transformation might have already got been heralded by the truth that this 12 months’s anticipated iPhone SE 4 was changed by the iPhone 16e – whose identify makes it clear that it’s half of the present iPhone lineup, which launched in September 2024.

Foundry | Alex Walker-Todd
Not solely will this launch technique imply that Apple will get two bites of the cherry (if that’s not too many fruit references) the place gross sales and media consideration are involved, it additionally signifies that anybody eager to be among the many first to get the newest iPhone may have no alternative however to go for a pricier mannequin. And tech journalists worldwide might be relieved at not having to sit down via an prolonged keynote, plus reporting on and reviewing six fashions on the identical time.
Do you have to be taking all of this with a beneficiant portion of salt? ET-Information does have a combined historical past on the subject of predictions about upcoming Apple merchandise, having claimed in early 2024 that an Apple ring was imminent. Nevertheless, it’s not the one publication to voice this hearsay, and it’s not the one time we’ve heard it.
However is there a greater choice than a brand new iPhone? The newest Google Pixel 10 telephones might tempt you to modify.
This text initially appeared on our sister publication Macwelt and was translated and tailored from German.
