The iPhone 6, Apple Watch And More

As usual, Apple’s Tuesday reveal was high on theatrics. Between CEO Tim Cook’s teasing “One more thing” (echoing the late Steve Jobs’ signature line—not once, but twice) and a U2 song release, the company announced several notable new gadgets.

iPhone 6 Plus

Apple announced its biggest iPhone 

yet, one with a display 5.5 inches across the diagonal. The phablet contains 185% more pixels than the previous iPhone 5S while measuring measures 7.1mm, or 0.5 mm thinner than the previous iPhone 5. Apple also claims the battery will survive 24 hours of 3G talk time (as if that's what smartphone users care most about). But the performance will be much faster, thanks to its new 64-bit A8 processor chip. The iPhone 6 Plus starts at $299 for 16GB, $399 for 64, and $499 for the equally enormous new 128GB—all prices that require a two-year contract.

iPhone 6

Technically this is the "small" one, but with a 4.7 inch display, it’s actually larger than any of its predecessors—the iPhone 5S screen was just 4 inches. A 64-bit A8 chip provides 25 percent faster CPU performance and up to 50 percent faster graphics performance. The iPhone 6 starts at $199 for a 16GB configuration, then goes up to $299 for 64GB and $399 for 128GB, all with 2-year contracts.



Apple Pay

Apple Pay is a new scheme that lets you make purchases in stores without taking out your credit card. Just add your credit card to the Apple Pay app on your iPhone, and tap it against an in-store terminal (at a participating merchant) to pay. Apple Pay relies on the security of the Touch ID fingerprint scanner and a new hardware component it calls the "secure element" to ensure your credit card information stays where it belongs.

Apple Watch

It does more than tell the time. This wrist-mounted wearable receives iPhone notifications, tracks your fitness, talks to other Apple Watches and captures your heartbeat pattern, among other both seriously useful-sounding and gimmicky-sounding features. Outside developers will be able to build apps for it using the upcoming WatchKit SDK. When it is available early next year, the Apple Watch will retail at $350.

Apple sells a record 4 million iPhone 6 units in just 24 hours

Apple fans are responding to the two larger iPhone 6 models with great enthusiasm. The company announced on Monday that it sold 4 million iPhones in the first 24 hours. U.S. carrier AT&T also boasted that this has been its biggest iPhone preorder launch in history

The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus both became available for preorder on Friday September 12 at 12 p.m. PST 

in several countries, including the United States. Customers in the U.S. reported many problems during the first few hours after preorder opened up. Apple’s website and the sites of all the major carriers that were selling the new iPhones, including AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint, crashed frequently. Technical problems aside, Apple is having no problem selling the iPhone 6 and its big brother, the iPhone 6 Plus.

“iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus are better in every way, and we are thrilled customers love them as much as we do,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Preorders for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus set a new record for Apple, and we can’t wait to get our best iPhones yet into the hands of customers starting this Friday.”

The iPhone 6 Plus was the first to model to sell out and is currently listed on Apple’s website with an estimated ship date of 3-4 weeks. Meanwhile, the smaller iPhone 6 has a 7-10 day ship date estimate.



Apple sold 9 million iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C units during its first weekend of sales last year. So far, the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus are set on a record-breaking pace and it hasn’t even arrived in stores yet.

Both iPhone 6 models will arrive in stores on Friday September 19 in the U.S., Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Puerto Rico, Singapore, and the U.K. Apple plans to launch the new iPhones in dozens of other countries on September 26, including Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, and United Arab Emirates.