John Ternus, in his first earnings call as Apple’s chief executive, told investors on Nov. 2 that the iPhone Duo cannot be made fast enough and that the company has no date for when shortages will end. Orders placed the same day already carry January delivery estimates. Anyone hoping to find a foldable under the tree is looking at a long wait.
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The admission came alongside a record quarter, which makes the contrast sharper. Apple’s September results were strong without a single Duo in them, because the device went on sale after the quarter closed. The sources reviewed give no unit count for early sales, so the size of the gap between demand and supply is not public, and the only measure on offer is how far out the delivery estimates now run.
What Ternus said about supply and demand
Ternus spoke to Reuters after the results were released, and MacRumors relayed his remarks. He said that “Duo is constrained as of today” and that Apple is “not able to predict when supply and demand will be in balance.” Stores have held little stock for online reservations, and new orders show delivery estimates in January.
The wording matters for shoppers because it removes the usual reassurance. A supply constraint with a forecast lets a buyer plan, whereas one without a forecast leaves the decision between waiting, hunting for a store unit or giving up on a holiday purchase.
A record September quarter with no Duo sales
Apple reported September-quarter revenue of $114.5 billion, up 12% from a year earlier, according to MacRumors’ earnings report. iPhone revenue reached $57.6 billion, up 17%, and the company said supply was constrained there too. Services hit an all-time high at $31.6 billion. Apple guided December-quarter revenue growth of 7% to 10%, with margin pressure from rising memory costs, and said it raised prices on Mac, iPad and iPhone products.
Beyond revenue and the outlook, gross margin rose to 47.9% from 47.2% a year earlier, helped by about a point of tariff refunds. For the December quarter, Apple guided gross margin to 45% to 46% and operating expenses of $20.4 billion to $20.8 billion, citing memory costs and the expense of ramping Siri AI features. Fiscal 2026 closed with $478.8 billion in revenue, another record, and Apple returned $28 billion to shareholders in the quarter. A pricey new foldable arriving into a rising-cost environment is part of why the supply question draws so much attention. One discrepancy sits in the coverage of the results: MacRumors lists net income at $30.7 billion in one place while noting that remarks on the call cited a different figure, $37 billion, so that figure should be checked against Apple’s own filing before anyone repeats it. The record revenue and the Services total are not in dispute in the coverage.
Display complaints and the replacement process
Supply is not the only issue facing the phone. Ternus said “a very small percentage” of units have been returned over a problem with the inner display, and Apple is offering replacements, with customers who have trouble directed to AppleCare. MacRumors reported earlier that some affected owners received in-store replacements right away while others, because stock is limited, were left waiting, which ties the repair queue to the same constrained supply that frustrates new buyers.
The cracking reports began at launch. MacRumors documented them on October 23, noting that nearly all faults ran along the hinge, and Apple told the site on October 26 that it was aware of an issue affecting a small number of units. The company’s statement then said most users should not see the problem and that it does not expect it to appear over time. MacRumors also reported that Apple alerted its stores about the cracking on October 30, though the details of that notice were not available.
iPhone Duo supply and the open-ended backlog
Apple announced the Duo on September 9 and began pre-orders on October 16. The iPhone Duo roundup shows a launch in more than 70 countries on October 23, followed by 28 more on October 30, with prices starting at $1,999 for 256GB and reaching $3,199 for 2TB. Every added country adds demand to a product Ternus says Apple cannot yet supply.
For a shopper, the practical steps are limited by the facts on record. Online reservations have seen little stock, orders placed on Nov. 2 show January arrival, and anyone who already owns a unit with a display fault is told to contact AppleCare. Apple has not said whether replacement units will be drawn from the same limited pool as new sales, so the effect of returns on availability is unclear.
The unresolved question is how long the January estimates hold. Ternus gave no timeline for catching up, and this was his first earnings call since taking the chief executive role, and the next set of numbers, the December-quarter report, will be the first to show how many Duos Apple actually delivered.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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