iPhone 15 release date — our prediction for the exact day based on evidence

iPhone 15 release date
(Image credit: Future/Apple/Andrii Tokarchuk/abluecup)

"When will the iPhone 15 drop?" is the question of the hour. The iPhone 15 release date is set to be unveiled today, and although Apple has not officially confirmed when we'll be getting our hands on these new smartphones, we can make predictions based on previous launch dates.

Hardware companies are rarely inconsistent with launch dates, and Apple is no exception. Yearly products of this kind often need to be released in a tight window, otherwise, it'll be hard to sell people on your newly released product if a new one comes out too close to the previous model. And based on the iPhone release dates for the past several years, we have a prediction on when the iPhone 15 is coming out.

When will the iPhone 15 drop? (prediction)

With the Apple September event falling on Sept. 12, that should mean that the iPhone 15 will be available to preorder on Sept. 15 and have a release date of Sept. 22. Read on for the logic behind our educated guess.


We are 99.99% sure that the iPhone 15 series will debut at Apple's September event today, as Apple has not missed this announcement window since 2012.

But iPhone launch dates are nowhere near as consistent. The only complete pattern is that they have been released in the fall ever since the iPhone 4S (excluding SE models), which came out all the way back in 2011. Otherwise, specific months can be a bit jumbled, but from analyzing previous dates, it's clear that Apple favors one specific month over others.

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iPhone release dates
PhoneRelease dateDay of the week
iPhone 14September 16, 2022Friday
iPhone 13September 24, 2021Friday
iPhone 12October 23, 2020Friday
iPhone 11September 20, 2019Friday
iPhone XSSeptember 14, 2018Friday
iPhone XNovember 3, 2017Friday

As the table indicates above, Apple adores September. If we disregard the iPhone 12's October launch (a result of COVID-19 delays) and iPhone X's November release (delayed due to issues with original Face ID hardware), a majority of the previous six iPhone models were released within a ten-day span from Sept. 14 to Sept. 24

There are only two Fridays that fall within that aforementioned ten-day span this year, and those are Sept. 15 and Sept. 22. 

iPhone 14 Pro

(Image credit: Laptop Mag)

Prior to Apple locking in its event as September 12, it was pretty much a coin toss, but we can now be confident that the pre-order should be on Sept. 15 with the phones shipping and available in-store on Sept. 22.

You can follow along with all of the announcements on our Apple September event liveblog if you can't watch the event live.

Claire Tabari
Contributing Writer

Self-described art critic and unabashedly pretentious, Claire finds joy in impassioned ramblings about her closeness to video games. She has a bachelor’s degree in Journalism & Media Studies from Brooklyn College and five years of experience in entertainment journalism. Claire is a stalwart defender of the importance found in subjectivity and spends most days overwhelmed with excitement for the past, present and future of gaming. When she isn't writing or playing Dark Souls, she can be found eating chicken fettuccine alfredo and watching anime.