The First iPhone Goes on Sale

The first iPhone went on sale in the United States on June 29, 2007 at 6 PM local time in each timezone. Steve Jobs had introduced it at Macworld on January 9, 2007, describing it as “an iPod, a phone, and an internet communicator” — three products in one. The original iPhone had a 3.5-inch 320×480 capacitive multi-touch screen (163 PPI), a 2MP camera, Samsung-manufactured ARM 11 processor running at 412 MHz, 128MB RAM, and either 4GB or 8GB of storage, priced at $499 and $599 respectively on a two-year AT&T exclusive contract. AT&T was the only US carrier; GSM-only, operating on EDGE (2.5G) data rather than 3G.

The device ran a stripped-down OS X (later named iPhone OS, then iOS) on a ARM processor using the same WebKit rendering engine as Safari on Mac. Safari on iPhone rendered full desktop web pages at smartphone scale — users pinched to zoom rather than viewing a separate WAP-formatted mobile site. Competitors including BlackBerry, Nokia (N95), and Palm Treo used physical keyboards, and mobile web access meant WAP-formatted sites with text-only content or limited graphics. Apple’s capacitive multi-touch screen — which required no stylus and responded to bare fingers — replaced the resistive touchscreens used on Windows Mobile phones of the period, which required a fingernail or stylus to register precisely.

Apple sold 270,000 iPhones in the first 30 hours and 1.4 million in the first quarter (Q3 2007). The limitations were significant: AT&T EDGE data averaged 100–200 Kbps rather than the 3G speeds available on competing phones; the App Store did not launch until July 10, 2008 with iPhone OS 2.0; no MMS, no copy/paste, no video recording, and no GPS at launch. iPhone 3G (July 11, 2008, $199 on contract) addressed the carrier speed limitation; the App Store transformed the hardware into a software platform. The first iPhone’s nine-month announcement-to-criticism window between January and October 2007 (when Google announced Android) ensured that every major technology company saw it coming and could not stop it anyway.

Why This Moment Mattered

The topic is useful because it captures a broader shift in how people build, use, and understand technology. In the short term, it gave users and developers something concrete to react to. In the longer term, it became part of a larger pattern in hardware, software, technology-history: hardware, software, services, and user expectations were all changing at the same time.

A good technology milestone usually matters for more than one audience. Enthusiasts notice the specifications or the interface first. Developers ask what new assumptions they can make. Companies look at cost, compatibility, and strategy. Ordinary users mostly notice whether the result makes their devices faster, easier, safer, or more useful.

The Broader Context

This period of computing was shaped by several overlapping transitions: faster networks, more capable mobile devices, cloud infrastructure, stronger security expectations, and software that changed continuously after release. Against that background, the milestone was not an isolated headline. It was one piece of a much larger movement away from static products and toward connected platforms.

That context helps explain why some announcements that looked modest at the time became important later. A browser feature, processor change, development tool, or platform policy can alter what future products are able to assume. Once enough users, developers, and vendors adapt, the new assumption becomes normal.

Looking Back

The value of revisiting the moment is that it shows how technology history is built from many medium-sized steps. Some are celebrated immediately, while others become meaningful only after the ecosystem catches up.

Looking back also keeps the story balanced. Progress usually brings tradeoffs: performance against power use, openness against consistency, convenience against control, and speed against stability. The most interesting milestones are the ones that reveal those tradeoffs clearly. This one belongs in that category because it helps explain not just what changed, but why the direction of computing kept moving the way it did.