You probably remember the black turtleneck. You definitely remember the "three revolutionary products" line—a widescreen iPod, a mobile phone, and a breakthrough internet communicator. But if you ask the average person about the release date of the first iPhone, they usually get the timeline a bit fuzzy.
Most people point to January. That’s when Steve Jobs stood on stage at Macworld in San Francisco and effectively ended the era of the plastic keyboard. But the reality is that the device wasn't actually in anyone's hands for months. There was this agonizing, five-month gap where the world knew the iPhone existed but couldn't touch it.
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The Day Everything Changed: June 29, 2007
The official release date of the first iPhone was June 29, 2007. It was a Friday.
Apple actually closed its retail stores at 2:00 p.m. that day just to prep for the madness. When the doors reopened at 6:00 p.m. local time, the lines were already blocks long. Some people had been camping out for days. Honestly, looking back at the 2007 footage, the hype felt more like a Star Wars premiere than a phone launch.
It’s easy to forget how much of a gamble this was. Back then, the titans were BlackBerry and Nokia. They had physical buttons. They had plastic screens you had to mash with a stylus.
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Apple’s "Jesus Phone" (as the media called it) was all glass and metal. It cost $499 for the 4GB model and $599 for the 8GB version. And keep in mind, that was with a two-year contract from AT&T, which was the exclusive carrier at the time. Adjusting for inflation, that's over $900 today for a phone that couldn't even record video or copy-paste text.
The Stats from that First Weekend
- Sales: Roughly 270,000 units sold in the first 30 hours.
- The Milestone: It took just 74 days to hit one million units sold.
- The Specs: A 3.5-inch screen (tiny by 2026 standards) and a 2-megapixel camera.
- The Network: It ran on 2G EDGE. It was slow. Kinda painfully slow.
Why the Gap Between Announcement and Launch?
Steve Jobs announced the iPhone on January 9, 2007. Why wait until June to sell it?
Basically, the phone wasn't finished. When Jobs did that legendary demo, the software was incredibly buggy. The engineering team had to create a "golden path"—a specific sequence of taps that wouldn't crash the device. If he played music first and then sent an email, it worked. If he did it in reverse? Total system meltdown.
They spent those five months frantically polishing the code and getting FCC approval. Usually, companies keep secrets until the last second to avoid "Osborning" their current products (killing sales of old stuff by announcing the new). But Apple didn't have a phone to cannibalize. They needed the hype to build. And boy, did it build.
What it was Like to Use that First Summer
You've gotta understand: there was no App Store on the release date of the first iPhone.
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If you wanted to do something on the phone, you used what Apple gave you. Maps, Weather, Notes, and a very basic version of Safari. Steve Jobs actually thought "web apps" were the future and didn't want third-party software "gumming up" the OS. He eventually lost that argument, thank God, but not until a year later when the iPhone 3G and the App Store arrived in 2008.
Despite the missing features—no GPS, no MMS, no front-facing camera—the "pinch-to-zoom" gesture felt like actual sorcery. I remember seeing a guy in a coffee shop scrolling through a webpage by flicking his thumb. It looked like he was interacting with the future. Because he was.
The Critics Who Got it Wrong
It’s fun to look back at the skeptics. Steve Ballmer, the CEO of Microsoft at the time, famously laughed at the iPhone. He told USA Today there was "no chance" it would get significant market share. He thought the price was too high and the lack of a keyboard was a dealbreaker for business users.
Even some tech journalists thought it would flop. They called it a "luxury bauble." They were wrong because they viewed the iPhone as a phone that could do internet stuff. It was actually a mobile computer that happened to make phone calls.
The Immediate Aftermath
By the time September 2007 rolled around, Apple did something that made early adopters furious. They killed the 4GB model and dropped the price of the 8GB model by $200.
Imagine paying $599 on June 29, only to see it cost $399 eight weeks later. The backlash was so intense that Jobs had to post an open letter on Apple's website. He offered a $100 store credit to anyone who bought the phone at the original price. It was a rare moment of "oops" for a company that usually moves with surgical precision.
Practical Takeaways for Tech Historians and Collectors
If you're looking into the history of the release date of the first iPhone, here is what you need to know for 2026:
- Check the Model Number: The original iPhone is model A1203. If you find one in a box, check the back.
- The "Sealed" Market: Unopened original iPhones are now selling at auction for upwards of $50,000 to $150,000. If you find one in your attic, don't open the plastic wrap.
- Check for 2G Support: Most carriers have shut down their 2G networks. This means an original iPhone today is basically just a very expensive, very small iPod. It won't actually work as a phone on modern networks.
- Battery Care: If you have one for a collection, these old lithium-ion batteries can swell and crack the screen. It's a "ticking time bomb" for collectors.
The release date of the first iPhone wasn't just a product launch; it was the start of the "mobile-first" world we live in. It changed how we eat, how we date, how we work, and how we argue. June 29, 2007, was the day the PC started its slow decline and the pocket-sized computer took over the world.
To verify if your old device is an original 2007 model, check the back casing—it should have a silver aluminum finish with a black plastic section at the bottom for antenna reception. Later models like the 3G and 3GS had full plastic backs in either black or white. If you're looking to preserve one, keep it in a temperature-controlled environment to prevent the battery from expanding and ruining the logic board.