In recent years, Apple’s iPhone Pro models have typically been its biggest sellers, but while that appears to still be the case this year, initial demand for the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max is reportedly much lower than its predecessors.
Ming-Chi Kuo, an analyst with a long history of Apple information, has conducted a supply chain survey to estimate the pre-order numbers of each iPhone 16 model, and found that the iPhone 16 Pro is down 27% compared to its predecessor, with 9.8 million pre-orders, and the iPhone 16 Pro Max is down 16%, with 17.1 million pre-orders.
This apparently came as a surprise to Apple, particularly in the case of the iPhone 16 Pro Max, as the company reportedly produced around 6 million units of the phone ahead of pre-orders, which is 106% more than it produced of the iPhone 15 Pro Max.
Still, it's not all bad news for Apple, because while initial demand for the Pro models has seemingly dropped, the standard iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus are reportedly proving more popular than their predecessors, with iPhone 16 pre-orders said to be up 10%, with 7.3 million units pre-ordered, and those for the iPhone 16 Plus said to be up 48%, albeit still with the lowest demand overall, with 2.6 million units pre-ordered.
But according to Kuo, that hasn't offset the waning interest in the Pro models, as the iPhone 16 line as a whole is estimated to have sold around 37 million units so far, which is 12.7% fewer than the iPhone 15 series did in its first weekend.
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Why is this? Kuo highlights the lack of Apple Intelligence at launch as a major factor. This suite of AI features is one of the key selling points of the iPhone 16 line, but no Apple Intelligence features will be available until October — and even then, we won’t initially get all of the features Apple has revealed.
Kuo also suggests that intense competition from Chinese phone brands has impacted pre-order numbers.
Beyond that, we think the standard and Plus models could prove more popular than their predecessors because they have more in common with the Pro phones. They have, for example, the new camera control button, which Apple could easily have made exclusive to the Pro phones.
They also gain the Action button from last year's Pro models and have a new A18 chipset rather than inheriting the A17 Pro from the iPhone 15 Pro line. All of this could make the Pro models feel less essential, so it's no real surprise that preorders for these are lower than for last year's models.
Still, Kuo predicts that demand for the iPhone 16 line as a whole could well pick up later in the year, once Apple Intelligence starts rolling out and once we enter the holiday season.
