It's not just that the iPhone X is small, but that demand for it is higher than for previous models / David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

Today, on the first day of pre-order for iPhone X in Russia, some Russian retailers were forced to close it by mid-day: the devices set aside for pre-order simply ran out. Demand for iPhone X is unprecedented - such expensive electronics have never been sold out so quickly by pre-order, say employees of two retailers.

iPhone lacks displays

By midday, the entire batch set aside for pre-order had been sold out by re:Store, part of Inventive Retail Group , its representative Lyudmila Semushina claims. Moreover, the smartphones set aside for online pre-order lasted only 6 minutes, she claims.

By about 13:00, the pre-order ended at M.video : the iPhone X was sold out, there were almost no iPhone Xs left, said its representative Valeria Andreeva. Now all the iPhone Xs allocated for pre-order have already been sold out, said MTS representative Dmitry Solodovnikov. Things are going the same way at another large retail chain, said its employee.

Sales of iPhone X will begin in Russia on November 3. For the first time, Russia has become one of the so-called first wave countries - in them, iPhone sales begin simultaneously with the USA. The iPhone X with 64 GB of memory costs 79,990 rubles, with 256 GB of memory - 91,990 rubles.

Apple itself began accepting pre-orders for the iPhone X at midnight California time (3am in New York, 8am in London and 10am in Moscow). Just 10 minutes later, customers placing orders began receiving messages that they would have to wait at least four weeks to receive their smartphone, writes the Financial Times. By 2:30 pm Moscow time, Apple's Russian online store promised to deliver the new product in five to six weeks. Apparently, this reflects both exceptionally high demand and a more limited supply than in previous premieres, the Financial Times suggests. The supply of components for the iPhone's 3D camera and edge-to-edge OLED screen is limited - the media have been reporting on problems with their production for several months. Apple itself acknowledged them in September.

Why the shortage?

An employee of one of the Russian retailers also agrees that the increased demand for the iPhone X was compounded by a shortage of the smartphone. Eldar Murtazin, a leading analyst at Mobile Research Group, claims that the first batch of iPhone X delivered to Russia will include approximately 15,000 devices (compared to 40,000 iPhone 8s that appeared in Russia at the end of September 2017). The shortage could lead to the emergence of a gray market for the iPhone X - resellers are already ordering hundreds of devices, he says.

Prices in Russia for iPhone X will be among the highest in the world

Technologies / Personal technologies

An employee of an Apple partner company agrees with Murtazin's assessment. The first batch may be larger - but not by much, says an employee of one of the retail chains.

Estimates of the number of iPhone X smartphones that Apple may release in the coming months vary widely – from 20 million to 40 million, the FT notes. However, analysts agree that the shortage of gadgets this time will last longer than in the case of previous models. “We expect the order fulfillment period in November to be four to six weeks,” the newspaper quotes Gene Munster, who has been analyzing Apple products for many years. “The iPhone X will reach a balance between demand and supply in the global market somewhere in the first quarter of 2018, that is, three to four months after its release. Typically, this takes two to three months for a new model.”

It's not just that the iPhone X is small, but also that the demand for it is higher than for previous models. This is what representatives of retailers surveyed by Vedomosti believe. In the first four hours from the start of pre-orders for the iPhone X, 52% more devices were ordered than the iPhone 8 and 11% more than the iPhone 7, says Alexandra Pertseva, a representative of Euroset. According to Semushina, in 6 minutes, as many iPhone Xs were ordered at re:Store as iPhone 8s were ordered in a day. And Sergey Tikhonov from Svyaznoy claims that in the first three hours, as many iPhone Xs were ordered in his network as iPhone 8s were ordered in three days. They are not going to stop pre-orders. But among the first to receive the new products will be buyers who make an advance payment for the iPhone X, says Tikhonov.

The number of iPhone X that Apple will supply to Megafon is still unknown: if there are a lot of devices, the operator will be able to deliver ordered smartphones within 24 hours, if there are few, buyers will have to wait five to six weeks, says the operator's representative Yulia Dorokhina.

An Apple spokesman declined to comment.

iPhone X may become a shortage in Russia