iPhone Ultra will be announced in September but won't ship until October at the earliest
Apple's first foldable iPhone is expected to be announced at the usual September event alongside the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max, but won't actually go on sale until October at the earliest. That's according to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who estimates fewer than 1 million units will be ready to ship in Q3 2026—a fraction of the 20–22 million iPhone 18 Pro/Pro Max units forecast for the same period. For anyone planning to buy one on day one, the wait is likely to be longer than Apple's marketing will suggest.
The supply gap
Kuo's July 5 forecast puts total foldable iPhone shipments for the second half of 2026 at just 7–8 million units globally. That's well below the threshold Apple typically needs to support a simultaneous worldwide launch. The bottleneck isn't raw materials—it's the engineering complexity of the hinge mechanism, display yield rates, and SMT (surface-mount technology) assembly, per 9to5Mac. These are difficult manufacturing problems that can't simply be resolved by throwing money at the supply chain.
Kuo sees two plausible outcomes: Apple launches the Ultra alongside the iPhone 18 line with severely limited stock, or it delays the sale date by several weeks to build up inventory. He considers the second scenario more likely, and he has a direct historical comparison to back it up. Apple announced the iPhone X on September 12, 2017, but didn't open pre-orders until October 27—a six-week gap. MacRumors reports Kuo explicitly expects the iPhone Ultra to follow the same pattern, with a Q4 2026 pre-order window.
What this means for buyers
If you're in the UK, the iPhone Ultra is expected to start somewhere between £1,599 and £1,900—making it Apple's most expensive iPhone ever and potentially more than the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7, which retails at £1,799. In the US, the expected price is around $2,300–$2,500.
With supply this constrained, delivery lead times of four to six weeks are realistic once pre-orders open. Resale premiums of 50–100% are a near-certainty in the first months, so the secondary market will be brutal for anyone who misses the initial window.
Demand, Kuo notes, remains strong despite the price. Apple entering the foldable segment is a meaningful moment—but the Ultra will be a device many will announce they want before they can actually get one.
