Analyst: iPhone XR pre-orders weaker than expected

From a note to clients by TMT Researcher’s Jun Zhang that landed on my desktop Monday:

iPhone XR preorders have been weaker than our expectations, but slightly better than iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max preorders. In our Apple note on September 17, we believed combined iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max preorders were ~10 million in the first three days. Based on the iPhone XR currently having only one week wait time in China and no wait time in the US and other major markets, we believe XR preorders will equate to less than or equal to 12 million units.

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We believe iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max preorders have been generally stronger in the US than in China, while preorders for the iPhone XR have been stronger in China than in the US. We have been tracking iPhone XR preorder data in China, and our tracks indicate overall iPhone XR pre-registrations in China are ~2 million units for the first three days… iPhone XR pre-orders are similar to iPhone 8/8+ preorders in China last year, and slightly better than the 1.5 million XS/Max preorders in China. This is not a very exciting result.

My take: This is Zhang’s third report on “weak” iPhone sales in five weeks.

See also:

• Analyst: Chinese Golden Week phone sales weak
• Analyst: iPhone XS Max sold out over weekend, XS orders ‘very weak’