Even though Apple has yet to officially announce when it will release the next version of the iPhone, a new report claims that the company plans to ship as many as 26 million units of its iPhone 5. Digitimes reports via unnamed sources that Apple has decided to increase its shipments of all of its iPhones by between 12 percent and 13 percent for the second half of 2011. That includes shipments of iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, the CDMA version of the iPhone 4 and the upcoming iPhone 5.
Apple is expected to ship a total of 56 million iPhone units in the second half of 2011. Of that number, between 25.5 million to 26 million units are expected to be for the iPhone 5. Apple has delayed the launch of the iPhone 5 from its usual June/July release date. Rumors now have the iPhone 5 coming out sometime in September or October. Digitimes claims that shipments of the iPhone 5 have actually been lowered for the current third quarter from 7 million units to between 5.5 million to 6 million units. However, shipments of the iPhone 5 have now increased in the fourth quarter of 2011, from 14 million units to more than 20 million units.
Orders for the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4 will number 20 million units in the third quarter, but with the planned release of the iPhone 5, the older versions of the iPhone will be reduced to just eight million units in the fourth quarter of 2011. Overall, Apple will ship a total of 95 million iPhones worldwide in 2011.