An early analysis of web traffic suggests that the iPhone 6 may have outsold its iPhone 6 Plus big brother by eight to one, with the devices selling a combined 10 million units.
The iPhone 6 accounted for 1.6 percent of all iPhone traffic in the U.S. and China, with the iPhone 6 Plus coming in at only 0.2 percent.
Sales of both iPhone 6 models did so well that Apple CEO Tim Cook said that sales had "exceeded our expectations" and had shattered "all previous sell-through records by a large margin."
The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus broke a number of records, including Apple's own record of 9 million units reported for the first weekend of the iPhone 5c and 5s being on sale. Not only that, but sales of the iPhone 6 are picking up, while a year ago it was considered that iPhone sales were slowing down.
"Given the lower replacement sales the past 18 months we believe there is strong pent-up demand for the new, larger screen iPhones," said an analyst for Canaccord Genuity, Michael Walkley.
While it seems surprising that the iPhone 6 is selling so much more than the iPhone 6 Plus, in reality the eight-to-one figure rather accurately reflects the availability of the devices and both devices are currently sold out on the Apple online store. Not only that, but it was always expected that the smaller iPhone model would sell far better than its larger counterpart.
"While our team managed the manufacturing ramp better than ever before, we could have sold many more iPhones with greater supply and we are working hard to fill orders as quickly as possible," said Tim Cook in a statement.
The iPhone 6 Plus is also expected to sell a lot more in countries like China, where bigger screens are much more popular. Apple has not yet released either iPhone 6 models in China.
Additionally, online advertising network Chitika argues the iPhone 6's limited success is largely due to the fact it has a very "niche appeal" in Northern America. The ad network monitors traffic through ad impressions.
While Apple does not disclose sales of specific iPhone models, analysts expect to see clues about how many units were sold in the "average selling price" of iPhones when Apple releases its September quarter earnings report. More important, even more clues will be given when the company releases its December quarter financial results in January.
Reports indicate that the iPhone 6 models will be available in 115 countries before the end of the year, compared with the 100 countries that the iPhone 5s an 5c were available in.
