- The iPhone 12 release date has been postponed, Apple confirmed a few weeks ago. A new report mentions the launch delay, saying that the iPhone 12 Pros might launch even later than the iPhone X did back in 2017.
- The report also details the iPhone 12 design and main specs, which are all in line with previous reports on the matter. Apple plans to sell as many as 75 million iPhone 12 units this year alone.
- Apple will also launch an all-screen iPad Air, two new Apple Watches, a new HomePod speaker, AirPods headphones, and AirTags trackers this fall.
The year of the novel coronavirus may have changed everything about day-to-day life, but Apple will still unveil a new iPhone series this fall. The iPhone 12 launch event might be delayed by as much as a month, with the cheaper iPhone 12 versions supposed to launch in mid-October. The iPhone 12 Pros will arrive a few weeks after that, several leaks have claimed recently. While Apple confirmed a few weeks ago that the iPhone 12 would not be available in stores in late September, the company made no announcements about the next iPhone launch event or the phones’ launch date. An insider familiar with Apple’s plans has just revealed more details about the iPhone 12 series, as well as all the other new Apple products that Apple will launch in the coming months.
Notably absent from the Mark Gurman’s new Bloomberg piece about Apple’s upcoming plans is the ARM MacBook that appeared in a different report earlier this week. Apple teased back at WWDC 2020 that the first Mac with Apple Silicon inside will launch this fall, as the company plans to transition its entire PC fleet to its own processors. Some reports said the device would be unveiled during the iPhone event, but Gurman makes no mention of it.
Apple is about to launch a new iPad Air tablet this fall, with “an edge-to-edge iPad Pro-like screen,” the report notes. A recent leak showed us the purported user manual for the unreleased tablet, which revealed the device would pack a Touch ID button embedded in the home button.
The most exciting detail in the Bloomberg report concerns the Apple Watch. That Apple is going to unveil a new Series 6 flagship wearable, we already know. But the report indicates that Apple is also going to replace the more affordable Series 3 device, which will compete with the lower-cost fitness devices. It’s unclear what sort of features the Series 3 replacement will deliver, but there’s no denying that the $199 Watch 3 was a massive success. A refreshed product would probably sell just as well, especially this year.
Apple is also going to unveil a smaller, more affordable HomePad model, and it’s expected to announce its first over-ear AirPods headphones. A new
Finally, Apple is expected to unveil the AirTags trackers during the iPhone event, which will come with a leather carrying case.
Bloomberg’s report focuses mostly on the iPhone 12 series, revealing that the design of the handset and many of its features were finalized before the main COVID-19 pandemic strike. But Apple had issues with final testing and had to delay the start of production by several weeks because of the pandemic. As a result, the cheaper iPhone 12 models will launch at an unspecified date in October, followed by the iPhone 12 Pro phones in November. While Gurman has no iPhone 12 release dates, the report notes that the iPhone 12 Pro will hit stores even later in the season than the iPhone X, which launched on November 3rd, 2017.
Apple has started mass-producing the iPhone 12 phones, and it’s expecting demand in line with previous years, the report says. Apple is making 75 million 5G iPhones this year, which is in line with the initial production plans for the iPhone 11 and iPhone XS series.
All four iPhone 12 phones will support 5G connectivity, but the report indicates that a few testers found that “some of the current 5G networks are not improving connection speeds much.” 5G connectivity will still be limited in certain countries.
Testers also revealed that the 6.7-inch is “one of this year’s most notable improvements,” but the report makes no mention of 120Hz support. The iPhone 12 Pros are rumored to get higher-refresh rate screens, although not all the leakers agree that the feature is ready to be deployed this year.
The report does say that all four iPhone models have updated designs with squared edges similar to the iPad Pro. The iPhone 12 Pros will come in 6.1-inch and 6.7-inch sizes and feature stainless steel mid frames. The Pros will also get a new dark blue color that will replace the Midnight Green on the iPhone 11. The regular iPhone 12 will feature 5.4-inch and 6.1-inch screens.
On the camera front, the iPhone 12 Pros will come with LIDAR sensors similar to the ones on the iPad Pro models.
