Despite Apple reporting a first time experiencing a decline in iPhone sales, the company is still moving a ton of products, just maybe not as much as it used to be. This is why it isn’t surprising to learn that Apple had no plans to reveal its launch weekend numbers, something that the company used to take great pride in.
Like we said, sales are on the decline, and now according to third-party analysts, it is down by a huge margin. If the numbers are any accurate, the analysts are claiming that the iPhone 7 launch weekend sales are down by 25% year-over-year. While we suppose we can’t really tell from a consumer standpoint, apparently that is the case as Apple has asked its chip makers to keep enough stock for 50 million iPhones during the third quarter, before reducing that number even further to 45 million during the fourth quarter.
It is an interesting observation if true because as you might recall, when pre-orders had first opened, all the phones were snatched up pretty quick, especially the jet black iPhone 7 Plus which had its shipping estimates slip to November. In fact it was so bad that there weren’t enough stock for in-store purchases on launch day itself.
In any case we guess we’ll have to wait for Apple’s next financial report to get a more official idea of how well its new iPhones are doing, but given the decline from the previous quarters and how saturated the smartphone market has become, we wouldn’t be surprised if the analysts are correct again.