Priced Up to 5 Million Won, Entire Stock Sold Out? Shipping Delayed to Late January

Apple's first foldable smartphone, the iPhone Duo, is seeing a continuous streak of sellouts immediately after pre-orders began, despite its price exceeding 3 million won.

Pre-orders for the iPhone Duo began at 9 p.m. yesterday (October 16) in South Korea.

On Coupang, the prepared unlocked inventory sold out immediately after pre-orders started, and pre-order stock on Apple's official online store also sold out rapidly.

In the early stages of the pre-order opening, buyers could receive their devices on the official release date of October 23. However, with allocations for November and December shipments also exhausted, the estimated delivery dates for all models were pushed back to mid-December in about 25 minutes from the start of pre-orders.

Afterwards, regardless of color or storage capacity, the earliest estimated delivery date was shown as January 22 of next year.

This means that those who order now will not receive their products until three months later.

A similar phenomenon occurred in the United States.

Following the start of pre-orders on October 16 local time, shipping delays began just minutes later, and it was reported that estimated delivery dates for all models were pushed back to January of next year in about 30 minutes.

Apple stated that pre-order demand for its first foldable iPhone is unusually strong and that it is working to supply the products as quickly as possible.

However, Apple did not disclose whether enough inventory would be secured for customers who failed to secure pre-orders to purchase the device at offline Apple Stores on the launch day.

As pre-order stock rapidly depleted in South Korea and the U.S. despite prices reaching up to 5.09 million won, Apple's first foldable phone is showing signs of an early box-office hit.

(Produced by An Hyemin | Edited by Na Hong-hee | Design by Lee Jung-joo | Produced by SBS Digital News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.