San Francisco, Sep 23 (IANS) As the sale of iPhone 8 and 8 Plus began in several countries on Friday, queues outside Apple Stores were shorter than previous years and the growing craze to own “super premium” iPhone X is likely to be the reason, media reported.

The various Apple Stores across the world reportedly saw a lot thinner crowd, far fewer than last year’s iPhone 7 launch, tech website CNET reported on Saturday.

Most people seem to be holding out for the crown jewel of this year’s iPhone series launched — the iPhone X, costliest of them all with price starting at $999.

Even on home turf, the Apple Store at San Francisco’s Union Square did not perform well.

“A 38-year old tourist from Brazil, Thais Aguilar, was contemplating whether to get an iPhone 8 before she flies back home Saturday. After a while, she decided to wait to buy an iPhone X back home and pay possibly three times as much as the $999 price in the US,” the report added.

Instead, Aguilar opted to buy Apple Watch Series 3. “Many other customers also seemed to prefer buying Apple Watches instead of iPhone 8 and 8 Plus, the report added.

This confirms earlier reports that iPhone X will cannibalise iPhone 8 orders.

“While it takes three to six weeks or more to ship new iPhone models after they are available for preorder, they see the iPhone 8 taking less than one to two weeks. This is due to the iPhone X cannibalisation,” Ming-Chi Kuo, the most famous Apple analyst with KGI Securities said earlier this week.

Ming, however, said the new Apple Watch Series 3’s (GPS + Cellular version) could be a runaway hit.

“We estimate the preorder weighting of the GPS + Cellular version is 80-90 per cent. While not available in all countries, most users have pre-ordered the GPS + Cellular version because it offers phone and internet access functions without an iPhone and given the low premium of $70 over the GPS version,” the analyst had predicted.

iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus were made available from September 22 in the US, Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Singapore, the UAE, the UK and other countries.

Apple would launch iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, starting Rs 64,000, in India on September 29 while pre-bookings started on September 22.

The iPhone X will come to India on November 3, starting Rs 89,000.

Apple Watch is available in two different case sizes, 38mm and 42mm from September 29 in India.

Apple Watch Series 3 (GPS) will be available in gold, silver and space grey aluminium cases with a Sport Band, starting at Rs 29,900.

–IANS
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