iPhone X release: Apple forces people to wait weeks for new phone after it sells out in minutes

The wait time is already a matter of weeks, and quickly increasing

Apple fan Shoko Kimura (C), who has been waiting in line to purchase new Apple Watch, reacts with Apple Store staff as she enters the Apple Store in Tokyo's Omotesando shopping district, Japan, September 22, 2017 (REUTERS/Issei Kato)

The iPhone X has finally opened for pre-orders, but it doesn't mean you're going to be able to get one.

The new phone sold out within 10 minutes, amid rumours of Apple having problems making them. And anyone buying them now is going to be forced to wait for weeks until they actually get hold of one.

Even before the phone was unveiled, it was rumoured that it would be very difficult to buy, with the new features in the phone requiring new production techniques that take much longer. Multiple reports suggested that the phones wouldn't be readily available – in the sense of strolling into a shop and buying one – until the new year.

Now that appears to be true, with the Apple Store selling all its stock almost instantly and similar problems reported at resellers. The stock shortages are being reported around the world, in the US, the UK and elsewhere.

It remains to be seen whether the problems are the same when the phone goes on sale at Apple Stores next week. But the company warned people to "arrive early", suggesting that there will be limited stock there, too.

For now, anyone buying from the Apple Store website is being told they'll be waiting around 5-6 weeks. That number is quickly increasing, and so it's not impossible that it will be a matter of months by the time the day is over.

There might be one silver lining. Apple usually overestimates how long it will take new products to arrive – presumably to avoid disappointment – so it's possible that the handsets might turn up earlier than expected. But that's far from guaranteed.

Networks and carriers have been given their own allocation of the phones, to sell as they wish. So it's worth checking with yours to see how their stock is doing – a number of people have reported having more luck buying the phones through phone companies than through Apple directly.