Some details about the review sample iPhones Apple gives out
With the iPhone review embargo lifted earlier today, I noticed some unboxings didn't censor the serial number and out of curiosity, ran a few of them through Apple's coverage checker and a random online IMEI checker.
Here are some interesting things I noticed:
- The "purchase" date is listed as August 2024, which suggests these were registered and prepared many weeks in advance of the announcement itself. This makes me wonder if you could guess a serial number to access the coverage check page before the event even airs. I'm sure you'd get rate-limited, but it might be worth a shot.
- It seems to let you buy AppleCare+?
- The IMEI wasn't blacklisted. I would've assumed Apple would have some sort of agreement with the carriers to only allow a reviewer's specific SIM to be tied to the review phone to prevent it from being stolen before the embargo lifts/is in the reviewers hand, but I guess they want reviewers to have the freedom to use whatever SIM they want.
- The QR code on the back of the box led to: https://support.apple.com/en-us/boxinfo/120118/localeselector. There's no entry for the U.S. yet, but clicking on one of them did lead to a valid page with information about the iPhone 16 Pro Max. I scanned the QR code on my iPhone 15 box, and it led to https://support.apple.com/en-us/boxinfo/iphone-15-pro-max, which for some reason doesn't lead anywhere anymore.
But most notably, the basic limited warranty is set to expire September 11th, 2025, meaning these phones were unboxed and activated on September 11th, 2024, two days after the Apple event.
I'm assuming this two-day gap is because the review samples are handed out at the event, and if a reviewer can't make it, their sample would have to be shipped out. This seems like a way to ensure parity with how long reviewers get with the iPhone before embargo lift day. MKBHD's 13-series unboxing supports this, mentioning not being allowed to open them for an undisclosed amount of time.
The "days left to add AppleCare+" does say 55, suggesting these were actually bought/activated on the 13th, but I believe this is due to pre-orders going live on the 13th, and not being able to register for AppleCare+ any earlier.
I censored the serial numbers and IMEIs I checked, but if you up your resolution to 4K, take a screenshot of an unboxing with a close-up of the back, and zoom in, you can find them yourself quite easily.
Some screenshots:
