A new report indicates that in the first 30 days on sale, the iPhone 6 outsold the iPhone 6 Plus among consumers by a three-to one margin, in line with the industry expectations revealed recently by T-Mobile CEO John Legere.
When Apple released its new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 plus back on Sept. 19, the big question on everybody's minds, besides which one to order for themselves, was how the sales of the iPhone 6 Plus would stack up against the more traditionally sized iPhone 6. The Plus was Apple's first foray into the phablet market, in an attempt to grab some of the market share from Android phablets like Samsung's Galaxy Note 4, Galaxy Note Edge, and Google's Nexus 6.
The first signs were positive in that the iPhone 6 plus immediately sold out on preorder, and became almost impossible to find once release day came around. In fact, people are still waiting to receive their back-ordered iPhone 6 Plus, and reviews and reaction have generally been very positive. But the big question still remains, how is the iPhone 6 Plus selling?
An interview in the end of October, T-Mobile's Legere gave some insight as to how the phone was selling within his company. Legere stated that he, along with the industry, expected iPhone 6 Plus sales to account for 20 percent to 25 percent of the total iPhone sales figures, but that preliminary data showed that the ratio of sales of the larger phablet to the regular iPhone were almost even, with the iPhone 6 Plus accounting for 45 percent of sales at one point.
A new report indicates that the sales figures are more in line with the initial industry expectations stated by Legere. The report by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) states that for the first 30 days of availability for the new iPhones, the iPhone 6 accounted for 68 percent of sales while the iPhone 6 Plus accounted for 23 percent to 24 percent. The remaining 9 percent of sales went to older iPhone models such as the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c.
The report noted that when the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c went on sale last year, they accounted for 84 percent of total iPhone sales, which indicated consumers are more excited about the iPhone 6 and Plus then they were the previous models.
The big question mark that still remains, however, is how the supply constraints of the iPhone 6 Plus affected these figures, especially since they cover the first 30 days of release when iPhone 6 Plus availability was severely constrained. While its fair to assume that some customers who would have preferred an iPhone 6 Plus bought an iPhone 6 only because they couldn't locate the phablet in stock anywhere, how many buyers settled and how that affected sales breakdowns remains a mystery.
