iPhone 15 and Pro: Apple opens pre-orders for new handset

Once famous for its long lines, Apple now encourages customers to order online

The iPhone 15 Pro is shown after its introduction on the Apple campus in Cupertino, California (Jeff Chiu/AP) (AP)

Apple has opened pre-orders for the new iPhone 15 and 15 Pro.

The new handsets were revealed at a livestreamed event this week, and will go on sale next Friday, 22 September.

Pre-orders opened at 5am local pacific time, or 1pm in the UK. That is a little later than it used to be: Apple would open sales at midnight local time, which meant that customers on the east coast of the US had to wake up in the middle of the night if they wanted to ensure they were first in line.

In the hours before those pre-orders opened, Apple took its store offline. Those attempting to buy anything saw a message reading “we can’t wait either”, and telling customers to come back later on.

Apple was also once famous – and sometimes criticised – for the long lines that would appear outside of its stores ahead of the release of the iPhone, and the loud reception that customers received when they came to buy one. These days, however, it encourages people to buy the phone online if they can, and those queues have largely become a thing of the past.

Nowadays, the company offers a range of ways to pre-order, many of which are intended to avoid queueing either online or at stores. Customers could line up their pre-order in advance, for instance – through a system called ‘Get Ready’ that lets them choose which iPhone and financing options they want, so that they are waiting when pre-orders actually open.

Apple also lets people order their new products online and pick them up at a store, or to go to a store and have any out-of-stock products sent to them from there, in another measure that helps avoids lines or waiting.

As well as buying the new iPhone directly from Apple, various networks are offering their own deals. Carriers largely run on the same schedule, opening pre-orders on 15 September and then making the phones available a week later.

The iPhone 15 starts at £799, and the Pro version starts at £999. There had been considerable rumours in advance of the event that Apple was planning significant price rises – but prices actually fell slightly in the UK, while staying largely the same in the US.

The normal iPhone 15 largely brings last year’s iPhone 14 Pro upgrades to the less expensive phones, including the Dynamic Island and its processor, as well as new colours. The iPhone 15 Pro gets a faster chip, improved cameras, and a new titanium material.

The rest of the products unveiled during Apple’s ‘Wanderlust’ event – the Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Ultra 2 and new AirPods Pro – are already available to order.