iPhone 18 Pro Event Tipped As Apple Shifts Key Release Schedule Date

Apple's iPhone 18 Pro is expected to be announced on Wednesday, September 9th, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. This date is chosen because Labor Day falls on September 7th, and Apple typically avoids holding events directly after a holiday weekend. While pre-orders usually begin the Friday following the keynote, this year presents a unique challenge. The Friday after the event is September 11th, marking the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks. To avoid this sensitive date, pre-orders are now predicted to start on Saturday, September 12th. The new iPhones are then anticipated to go on sale to the public on Friday, September 18th. This adjusted timeline reflects Apple's careful planning around significant dates.

Aug. 14 update. This post, first published on Aug. 11, was updated with more details to the upcoming Apple event and revised pre-orders date.

The Apple iPhone 18 Pro will be announced on Wednesday, Sept. 9, according to a new report. Regular readers will know I’ve been saying that for weeks, and even researched every single iPhone keynote date to back up my claims, but there’s now confirmation from an industry heavyweight that this is the plan. Oh, and you can read about when the keynote will be announced here.

This is the big date in the calendar and sets the schedule for everything that follows.

“Historically, Apple has held its new iPhone launch on either the second Tuesday or Wednesday of September. That has been the case every year since 2012 (except for 2020, when Apple introduced its new phones in October due to the Covid-related production delays),” he said.

But the key update, a change from what Gurman has been saying until very recently, came next.

“But there’s a twist this year: Labor Day falls on Monday, Sept. 7. Apple doesn’t typically hold events directly after a weekend because it wants to give attendees a travel day. That makes Wednesday, Sept. 9, the most likely event date this year,” he added.

I think this is spot-on. It’s not just the attendees who don’t want to travel on a public holiday. Apple is reluctant to have its staff work on the holiday as well (although, again, I’m sure they will be taking part in plenty of meetings and other preparations on Tuesday, Sept. 8).

While Apple is sometimes predictable, that doesn’t mean that every item on the agenda will fall into the same schedule as last year.

He also added an extra detail that was news to me. I’d been predicting that pre-orders would open on the Friday after the keynote — that’s what almost always happens. But this year, that would be Sept. 11, a date that Apple has always avoided for keynotes.

This year, as it’s the 25th anniversary of 9/11, pre-orders might start later.

“Another wrinkle this time is the preorder start date. More times than not, Apple opens up iPhone preorders on the Friday following its event. Given that that Friday falls on the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, I find it unlikely that Apple would pick that date. The last time such a Friday fell on Sept. 11, Apple moved preorders to the next day, Saturday, Sept. 12. I have to assume they’ll take a similar approach this year,” Gurman said.

This makes sense to me. I believe the timing will be the same, that is, pre-orders will open at 5 a.m. Pacific, 8 a.m. Eastern, 1 p.m. U.K. time.

Note that sometimes pre-order dates vary according to product. For instance, it’s possible the Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4 could see pre-orders open on the same day as the iPhone or earlier, for instance the same day as the keynote or Thursday, Sept. 10.

I bow to Gurman’s wisdom, however, in saying that the Apple Watches won’t see pre-orders open on Friday, Sept. 11.

Some years, Apple allows customers to put their chosen items in online shopping bags the night before pre-orders open, so they’re ready to purchase on the B of the bang when they do open the next day. Such a move allows people to pick the model, color and storage capacity in the hope of getting their first choice.

It doesn’t happen every year and it’s possible the Sept. 11 issue may mean it won’t this time around.

Even if pre-orders are bumped by a day, that won’t affect when the next cycle of iPhone software is made available to users on general release.

After pre-orders, the next date on the calendar is when the software which will be pre-installed on the new iPhones is made available to everyone.

If your iPhone supports the current iOS 26 software, the good news is it will run iOS 27 as well. That means every iPhone going right back to the iPhone 11 released in 2019 is supported. This year, this is quite a big deal: there was a hesitation at first by some users to upgrade to iOS 26, not least because of mixed responses to the Liquid Glass design.

Since iOS 27 allows users to adjust the glassy effect to a more granular level, it may be that there will be a rush to iOS 27 from previous-gen holdouts.

The exact date varies but it usually falls on the Monday before the new iPhones’ onsale date. This year, that would mean Monday, Sept. 14. Timing also varies: where most iOS updates land at or around 10 a.m. Pacific, 1 p.m. Eastern and 6 p.m. U.K., the first release of the new cycle is often earlier.

Look out for it from 8 a.m. Pacific, 11 a.m. Eastern and 4 p.m. U.K., and please practice patience — a lot of people will be wanting to download it immediately.

The next event in the calendar will be the publication of the first reviews of the new iPhones and Apple Watch. Time and date here are less easy to pin down.

Apple usually seeds a small number of its new products to selected members of the press, sometimes straight after the keynote, though never beforehand.

Assuming the iPhone keynote is on Sept. 9, that’s a day later than usual, which gives reviewers 24 hours less to come up with their verdicts — if the embargo for reviews lifts on the same day as last year. In 2025, reviews appeared from 5 a.m. Pacific on Wednesday, Sept. 17.

Which would mean this year’s reviews would start to appear on Wednesday, Sept. 16. Apple could choose to bump the reviews date to the next day, Thursday, Sept. 17, to allow reviewers the same length of time to collect their thoughts.

I think that’s unlikely, as the company likes a couple of days between the reviews appearing and the phones going on sale. And in some years reviews have appeared on the Tuesday before the phones go on sale, so it’s even possible that Tuesday, Sept. 15 could be the date to watch.

My belief is that Wednesday will be the day — it’s a timetable Apple likes. And I think the timing will be the same, that is, 5 a.m. Pacific, 8 a.m. Eastern, 1 p.m. U.K.

Note that if any products announced at the keynote are delayed for any reason, like when the iPhone X was revealed in September 2017 but went on sale in November, reviews will also be held, until a few days before they go on sale. Of course, we’re only talking about the folding iPhone in all likelihood — more on that below.

Whatever the exact date of the keynote, the last part of the schedule — when the phones hit stores — is near-certain to be on the same day of the week, Friday.

In any event, the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max will go on sale on the following Friday, Sept. 18, I believe. Currently, there are conflicting rumors about whether the highly anticipated first foldable phone from Apple, possibly called the iPhone Ultra, will arrive at the same time.

As mentioned above, it could be announced at the keynote but scheduled for later release. In which case the pre-orders and on-sale date will come later.

Unlike pre-orders where the time is the same second across the globe, on-sale times are staggered. Expect to be able to pick up the new products from 8 a.m. local time, wherever you are.