iPhone XR October Ship Date Reportedly Due To Notched Liquid Display

Now that the rumors are over and Apple has revealed its three new iPhone models, all the speculation has turned to how many units Apple will sell. While the iPhone XS, XS Max, and XR were all announced at the same time, the cheapest version, the iPhone XR, will ship much later than the other two. The iPhone XS and XS Max with OLED screens will be available this Friday. The iPhone XR won't ship until more than a month after the other two devices.

This has left many wondering what's the holdup. Sure, some of the delay could be perceived as a ploy by Apple to get people to buy the iPhone XS and XS Max at $999 and $1099 respectively instead of the iPhone XR at $749, which is incidentally much more than rumors speculated the device would cost. The core reason why Apple is delaying the launch of the XR, according to a new report, has to do with the LCD the device uses.

While the kinks have been worked out of the notched OLED production process, issues have cropped up. The XR will use a Liquid Retina LCD that is made by Japan Display. The manufacturer reportedly has issues with low yields months ago during the ramp up production cycle. Reports now claim that the issue isn't just with the hardware, rather the issue is believed to be on the software side. The software and drivers necessary to make the iPhone XR possible is a challenge since this is the first notched screen LCD on the market according to IDC VP Ryan Reith. The executive also told The Verge that Apple has been unable to get enough of the displays and while production has been going on for a while the quality needed wasn't there.

Canalys analyst Ben Stanton also told The Verge that the only reason Apple would delay the iPhone XR is that it lacks supply to ship an adequate volume of the device. He also noted that the bottleneck is the new LCD. Apple has made no official comment on the shipping delay at this time. Some speculate that the delay of the iPhone XR could hurt sales of the iPhone XS and iPhones in general for a time. With such a massive price difference between the XS and XR, the chances of someone buying the smaller XS on impulse rather than waiting for the XR is low. With the XR being larger and looking very similar to the XS, Apple may find its iPhone XS a hard sell.