Apple’s new iPhones went up for pre-order this morning, and for those who stayed up late to get their order in, it turned out to be a very long night. The vast majority had to wait until past 12:30 a.m. before the had any joy loading the Apple Online Store, and when it finally went live, many iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus options were “currently unavailable.”
If you’ve ever pre-ordered an iOS device before, you were probably expecting some hiccups. Not even Apple’s website can handle tens of millions of people all trying to order the same thing at the same time. But this year’s pre-order mess seemed by far the worst in recent history — and it wasn’t totally due to overwhelming demand.
Although pre-orders were due to go live at 12:01 a.m. Pacific, most couldn’t gain access to the Apple Store app or the online store before 12:20 a.m. at the earliest, and even then, the ordering process was flaky. Most handset configurations were listed as “currently unavailable,” and the few that were there for the taking couldn’t be claimed before the Apple Store went down again.
This must be some kind endurance test, only those dedicated enough to hit Command-R for an hour get to pre-order an iPhone 6
— Dan Counsell (@dancounsell) September 12, 2014
But those who were persistent got their reward. By about 12:30 a.m., most configurations were available in most of the launch countries via the Apple Store app for iOS, and if you were fast enough, you could secure one for launch day delivery. Soon after, the Apple Online Store returned, too, but people were still reporting downtime past 12:45 on Twitter.
Here in the U.K., we managed to order a silver iPhone 6 Plus at 8:47 a.m. (12:47 Pacific) with launch day delivery, and those in other parts of Europe seemed to have some success after 12:30, too.
Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, it seemed the smaller iPhone 6 was the one to sell out first in most markets, with shipping times quickly slipping to 7-10 business days, and then 3-4 weeks. All three color options seemed popular in the U.K., but the 16GB iPhones lasted a little longer than the 64GB and 128GB ones.
If you ordered from a carrier instead, you probably enjoyed a much smoother experience. People who chose AT&T were able to pre-order there handsets as early as 11:45 p.m. Pacific, while Verizon and others were taking pre-orders from 12 a.m. and seemed to be able to keep their websites online.
However, T-Mobile in the U.S. isn’t taking pre-orders until 7 a.m. Central, according to reports on Twitter.
I just spoke to @TMobile preorder for iPhone 6 won’t be available till 7 AM Central time — Ezus (@cppk13) September 12, 2014
Did you get your iPhone 6 pre-order in before shipping times slipped, or will you be lining up for one on launch day?
Killian Bell is a freelance writer based in the U.K. He has an interest in all things tech and also covers Android over at CultofAndroid.com. You can follow him on Twitter via @killianbell.
73 responses to “iPhone 6 pre-orders were a bigger mess than Apple’s keynote live stream”
No problem here, woke up at 5:30est and ordered White 64gb 4.7 and said it delivers 9/19.
Same here, ordered my Space Gray 64gb 6 at 5:45pst with delivery on 19th.
Yep, completed my order at 6:40 EST for a SpaceGray 64GB 6 deliver on the 19th.
Woke up at 2:54AM EST and completed my order with no issues.
Waited up refreshing the page for hours till I could get on the website which wasn’t till like 5 eastern time only to find out I could only choose Verizon’s more everything plan and not their $60month individual plan and nobody seems to know why.
Ordered mine in the UK this morning just before 9:00am – it was the easiest on-line order I’ve ever made from Apple (and I’ve made a lot!)
Vodafone UK was a disaster
Called at 07:58, automated system promised call back within 8 minutes.
Finally got a call around 09:30, when I commented on time the rep told me they had over 2,000 on hold!!!!!
In the meantime the website was unusable, with error messages, pages failing to load, unable to complete actions, finally start to work semi reasonably after 10:00
However, I think their deals are great for what I was looking for/needed, so I am a happy camper now!
If only there was a way for Apple to know that people would getting on the web and ordering the new iPhone, then they could plan for it.
Agree. Maybe Apple should hire a technology company to help them with tech issues… :-)
classic
what are you saying …. think about it !
Finally got my iPhone 6+ 64Gb ordered at 9:09am here in the UK. But delivery is not happening until 10th October!!!!!! Just shows how popular they are.
I managed to order an iPhone Plus just after 9.30 in the UK, 64 Gig in space grey and got the 7-10 days delivery time scale, happy with that though :)
It’s a labor of love.
If you used Sprint, the experience was horrid. The online store didn’t go live for ages. When I FINALLY got in the order wouldn’t complete. After being on the phone for over 2 hours I was nearly finished with the order and the called dropped. Do you think that the agent would have the gumption to realize something happened and call back? Absolutely not. This put me in the position of having to call back through and look at upwards of a 3 hour wait. Only for a ticket to Heaven would I endure that hell again. This was a nightmare. I don’t want the phone that badly.
Well that sucks. It’s not like the Sprint person didn’t have your contact info… Thanks for making it clear why being a Sprint customer is a bad idea. :)
Maybe here’s an idea…..wait another week before putting the product up for sale so the system can be tested and retested to ensure a good customer experience rather than ram this terror through everyone’s life. The New York Central was a big deal once as was PanAM…nobody can be too big to fail.
I had major issues with Verizon’s website and I wasn’t able to finally get my iPhone 6 Plus 64GB in Silver until about 4AM (Eastern). My partner decided he wanted one when we woke up this morning because Verizon enticed him with an early upgrade if he chose Edge and we were able to fly through the site for his iPhone 6 Plus 64GB in Slate, however his won’t ship until October 7.
Ordered min on the App Store app at about 3:15 am eastern time. Delivers on the 19
iPhone 6 plus 64 GB
I had no issues what so ever.
The App Store App always seems to be the best way to get through when it’s busy. In the morning (5:50 am PST) I was actually able to complete my order on a mac web browser though. As long as it’s coming by the 19th I’m a happy camper. It reminds me of the kinds of things you go through to get concert tickets and what not…
Same here got an iphone 6 plus in gold 128gb at 3:20 am eatern time.i used apple store app and will be ready to pick up on 19th
*sigh* every telco worldwide who offered pre-orders had prolonged capacity problems. (Including those which you listed as not having problems.) It’s clear that there is simply an unprecedented demand.
Even this website recognised that lots of refreshing would be in order.
http://www.cultofmac.com/295550/everything-need-know-pre-ordering-iphone-6/
Successfully ordered a white 128GB Plus in the US around 3:30am EST w/ a launch date delivery. The website still wasn’t coming online by that point, but the apple store app finally connected. I placed my order, and it went through smoothly without kicking me out once. But only 15min later I was seeing unavailable for most models, then within 25-30min the whole app was clogged with traffic, with the site still not even online.
How exactly is this a bigger mess than the keynote live stream? Like you said, you expect hiccups during the preorder process, which is much more complex than a simple video stream. So you had to wait in a virtual line to buy something. Big deal. First world problems.
I pre-ordered through AT&T at 3:30am EST for a 6+ 64GB in space gray…the website told me 14-21 days at the time, and 4 hours later I just got the e-mail confirming the pre-order, and it says 21-28 days!!! and now apple shows the same model shipping 3-4 weeks….I guess i’ll keep the AT&T order in place but disheartening that it could be a month before delivery.
Yeah. If I didn’t have my reservation # it would have been in that time frame when I ordered. I tried from midnight to past 1 am and it was tough.
Got through at 3:05 through the Apple Store app on my phone. After the completed I checked the website on my laptop and it was still down.
My initial order through AT&T ended up getting canceled, I’m guessing due to an error on my part. I ordered again through Apple at about 6:30am est and had no problem getting a 64 GB iPhone 6 in Space Gray with 9/19 delivery.
I live in the North Eastern Caribbean and had to wait 2 hours and a half before the store came back online. Should of taken a screenshot at 5 AM with the website still with “We’ll be back”! Even the mobile Mac App Store was dysfunctional. Got the order in at 5:25AM
Ordered the 6+ 64GB GOLD around 4am CST. Delivery is Oct 1-6th. I was up since 1:30 am CST. Thanks Apple while I go to work and fall asleep on the job.
I got my order in but it saying now that it will ship between 10/2-10/13 now as I ordered the 64G iPhone 6 Plus
Took me 45 min. Apple’s AND Verizon’s sites were terrible for me and my wife (but in their defense Verizon’s site is always painfully slow) Thank goodness I loaded the auto refresh for Safari thanks to your article yesterday! After five minutes it was more a matter of principle than anything else.
panicking much? isn’t it always like this every year? overwhelming demand brings down sites all over? moving along… Apple is doomed /s
It is like this every year which I think is why people are frustrated. Amazon seems to do well on black friday so there are companies who know how to handle large amounts of web traffic.
I am in california and I waited until 2am; the apple store was still “updating”. Frustrating.
Tried ordering on Verizon but kept getting an error message. Then tried the apple store app. It allowed me to put one phone in my cart but when I tried to add another it said currently unavailable. I ordered the one phone and about 15 minutes later it allowed me to order the second phone.
Sprint was a nightmare. Took 90 minutes before I could start ordering and then it was another 45 minutes of various issues before I could almost finish ordering. I gave up and went to Apple.com and got it around 5:30am. Now gotta wait 4-6 weeks but at least I know it’s getting here some day.
Anyone getting this message when checking order status?
I’ve gotten it a couple times. I’ve seen my order though, and it’s there.
Thanks. I seen it yesterday at least ten times earlier this morning, but I can’t see it since 7:30 am.
Ordered the iPhone Plus 16gb direct from verizons site, finished my order about 30 minutes into the start time of the pre order and it says deliver by Oct 14th. How is that even possible?
Looks like you’ve already ordered it in queue. It depends on which state you live and there are limit amount of queue is available on each states that you ordered your iPhone.
Good Luck :)
I ordered from ATT, a 6 plus, gold and 16 gig as soon as they started, even before 1 am and my confirmation email said 14 to 21 business days for delivery! Now when I check my order status it says 10/30 to 11/11! No freaking way! I will be canceling if it takes even the 14 days, forget waiting two months!!!
Same story here. So frustrated with ATT.
Very Disappointed & Pissed Off !!!!
I too ordered with a receipt confirmation in my inbox at 12:33am (CST 2:33am) from AT&T web site. It stated shipping date as 9-17, checked order status at http://www.att.com/myorder and it states: Preorder Processing
Expected Ship Date: 10/31/2014 To 11/11/2014
Screenshot of order confirmation web page.
It changed yesterday from (10-31 to 11-11) to (10-13 to 10-22), this morning it changed again for the better to (10-2 to 10-13). Hopefully it will change again, and again. I may have to change my user name here.
I got mine. It wasn’t easy and I was given a reservation number late last night after several attempts where I was on the order page and it teased me me showing “shipping 9/19” then “unavailable” as I tried and tried to order the thing. At around 5:40 this morning they let me go in and order through my reservation number and I should get it on or before 9/19. With all of us using 3 different devices to slam their server it’s going to be a nightmare.
Ordered mine pretty easily but ATT would only let me order one at a time even though I have two phones on my account. Hence my wife’s order is shipping on the 19th and mine is a week later even though I ordered the second one 5 minutes after. Both iPhone 6, space gray 64gb
No problem ordering with Verizon. I woke up at 5am CT and ordered the Space Grey 64Gb iPhone 6 with delivery on Sept 19. Smoothest iPhone order I’ve ever had.
Check your email confirmation. I ordered 3 hours earlier than you CT and mine moved that date out a month.
He could very well be getting the 6 on launch day… I’m noticing most of the delayed orders are for the Plus. No surprise though…
AT&T had two week shipping for iPhone 6 Plus right when preorders began. Shitty.
That is what I ran into has well. 14-21 days was the shipping estimate when I got in at midnight.
ordered mine at 12.45am pacific from the att business site, they will deliver it on the 19th
happens every year. Folks are so crazy to get the phone the second it comes out that they all hit the site right off and kill the system.
Uhhmm 12:30 PST??? No, thats not accurate. I kept refreshing for 1 hour, and it still did not work at 1 AM PST, yes the app started working at 12:30 but Apple did not permit purchasing un-subsizdized iPhone 6’s in the app, which I find extremely dumb.
The app also showed no stock on almost everything, so it was up but useless.
This rollout in its entirety has been bad, sub par, and not well thought out, Steve Jobs would have been so pissed if he was alive to see this.
The people that made the decision to not allow un-subsidized phones to be purchased in the app need to be fired.
The people who were charged with taking the site down and then putting it back up on time, should be fired, Apple knew before anyone else, months in advance when this pre-ordering event would take place and then to not be ready with months of preperation is simply pathetic and not have the site back online at midnight PST.
The people managing all these people in both cases should also be fired, they should have made sure their people were going to execute better. Remember Steve used to talk about “A Players”. These people would not be what Steve considered “A players”.
Lets not forget about the totally botched streaming problem, more non-A players.
I love Apple, I really do.
However, there are now signs of fat that need to be trimmed at Apple. I would expect this from a lesser company, but not Apple.
In the end I woke up on a work night at 3 AM (12 PST) to buy my new iPhone 6, was kept up an hour refreshing a browser to no avail, got absolutely nothing accomplished.
Today I am really tired, and pissed.. Luckily I still got a Sept 19 iPhone 6 shipment when I woke up this morning, but my friend, not so lucky, he gets to wait 4 weeks because I could not put his order in for a 6 Plus last night.
I want some B player heads to roll for my 3 AM waste of time Apple!
I want Tim Cooke to put out a public apology and privatly I want some B players to be fired. Thats what I want Apple.
T-Mobiles system is down doe the next 2 days, they are unable to process pre-orders, they just put you on a waiting list
T-Mobile’s web site has been locking up at the checkout since last night, i called to order by phone and had to wait for over an hour and at the end they said their system was down and was gonna be down for a couple of days so they couldn’t process any pre-orders, they just placed me on a priority waiting list :/ anyone here was able to pre-order from T-Mobile? please share your experience.
8 hours I spent today trying to order a 6+ 64GB Space Gray.. in the end EE’s website finally started displaying notices to ring up instead, hardly convenient when I’m abroad. 2 hours on the phone and I’m told I have to wait up to a month before I can expect anything to be dispatched. Some of you guys got real lucky, I had everything in the shopping cart so many times and it still died.
I got a “reservation” for a 128GB 6plus in space grey, when Apple finally emailed me to claim it, they offered me a lowly 6/16gb in silver. What is the point in the reservation tickets if it doesn’t reserve you the phone you want. This would not have happened under Steve Jobs. Complete mess!
Got confirmation email at 8.47 UK time -12.47PT and still only managed to get s 3-4 weeks delivery for a 6+ gold 128…
After watching my Apple Store window on 5-second autorefresh for 10 minutes at 2am CDT, I clicked on Verizon. Clicked an order in about 10 minutes and got a confirmation for a 128gb 6 Plus, showing a delivery date of 9/19, clearly part of the “first wave.” F*ckers sent a new confirmation today showing a SHIP DATE of 10/14. Nice.
The iPhone 6 was clearly more stocked than that of the 6+. In fact, so much so that just an hour ago did the shipping slip. I currently have both phones pre-ordered. The 6 will be going to a family member, while the 6+ will belong to me. She will get it on the 19th, while I will have to wait until the 1-6 of October.
Even this morning I tried on my iMac in Safari failed three times only after trying it on my iPhone in the Apple Store app did it go through. My brother failed 2 times also his third attempt on the iPhone went through, he was on at 3 AM. Wish he would have told me to use the iPhone first.[ he also tried once on ATT site fail there too]
Apple’s web site never loaded for me, and the Store App on my iPhone 5 listed everything as currently unavailable. Finally Verizon’s web site stopped giving me errors around 12:20 PST or so, and rather than fight with Apple’s web site, I just went for it. Unfortunately, I wanted the 64GB Plus in Slate Gray, which seems to be one of the most popular choices. So even though I was only 20 (MAYBE 30) minutes late, I get a “deliver by” date of 10/7/14. Good thing I’m calmer about this launch than I was for the 5… otherwise I’d go nuts.
What a waste of time and money just get the moto x+1 half the price, better specs, small sized phone with a 5.2″ display. Real Leather back options. Customizable voice command and Google now is more advanced than ever. Extremely fast device as it was on the original moto x which destroyed all current and upcoming devices. Google hangouts integrates into your texting just like Imessage but you don’t have only have Apple devices anyone can use it. There is also voice and video calls and soon free voice calling. Then Google plus I’d just so much more effective than Facebook and combines into hangouts along with giving you useful information instead of the junk your “friends” post every day since you are able to follow important groups or companies that matter to you. Not only that but the Iphone’s specs have just caught up to devices from 2011/2012.
Ordered mine at 09:24 after refreshing the web page for nearly an hour and a half and got a delivery of 10th – 17th Oct. Not impressed as I’d been there waiting for the process to start at 8:00 am and missed launch day delivery.
Made my order for a iPhone 6 Plus in gold at about 8.10BST, however Carphone Warehouse now say they’re awaiting confirmation from Apple on stock levels
Reread your article & in the first few sentences I believe you used the word THE & meant THEY. “Before THE had any joy” – Seriously?
At 3:01 AM EST (12:01 PDT) I attempted to place my order with verizon, got to checkout, then error. For the next two and a half hours nothing but ECPD error, apparently those with corporate discounts on verizon had this error. Until 5:30AM when I could finally place my order. I watched my 7/19 date slip all the way to 10/14… Now my verizon order has been updated stating that they no longer even have the 10/14 ship date, and they can’t give me a date when it actually will ship. 2 and a half hours and getting up at 3:00AM for nothing thanks for Verizon’s error.
Yep, I had problems. 3AM ET, the Apple site and Apple Store app just showed the blank white page. It was around 3:15 before I could get the App to work (site was useless and I gave up) No real issues preordering on the phone App at first, it was smooth..some slow moments..which became slower. Had the phone in the cart – 9/19 date, Ready to pay and…nope. App crashed! (had to quick check my card to see if I was charged or get an email with an order # first. Nothing) Started the app over and it just lagged, ended up getting errors, finally some reservation #. Waited for that email..gave up and went to bed. Email finally showed up at 8am. Finished the order but the 9/19 ship date that I was still promised now showed 7-10 business days. If thats actually the case, ok then I’m happy with that..my order still shows processing. Better than 3-4+ weeks though or not seeing this until Mid November.
The Verizon process was silky smooth. No issues at all.
I started the preorder fiasco like everyone else….refreshing my iMac, iPad and iPhone every few seconds. By about 3:30am the App Store finally came up on my iPad so I quickly configured my order. iPhone 6 Plus gold 64GB! I signed up for AT&T’s NEXT program. About halfway through the transaction I get an error popping up basically saying that because I live in NY state the transaction couldn’t be processed. Something to do with AT&T NEXT and Apples online store. I was beyond livid. Not only had I spent that long trying to get through I now had to go fight with AT&T’s site as my only option for preordering. AT&T’s site was horrendous. Crashing every 5 seconds, redirecting me, timing out and on and on. By about 4am it finally let me get my order through to the end. It successfully submitted the order with a confirmation. I didn’t receive an email till later the next day. I really didn’t know if I had an iPhone or not. The email stated that the phone would ship anywhere from 21 to 28 days from now. So much for getting it on the 19th. When I looked up my order status the day after on AT&T’s site the shipping estimate was 10/31 – 11/9. I was like are you kidding me, I just ordered the damn thing within the first hour. 2 days ago the shipping estimates changed to 10/13 – 10/22 which was a little better but I’m pretty impatient. The sad thing is there are probably millions of iPhones reserved for store level sales. They should be taking some of that stock for preorders.