The Apple Store is offline ahead of AirTag, purple iPhone 12 launches

Apple Iphone 12 Spring21 Purple
Apple Iphone 12 Spring21 Purple (Image credit: Apple)

What you need to know

  • Apple has taken its online store down ahead of purple iPhone 12 and AirTag orders.
  • The store should be back in just a few hours.

Apple has taken its online store down as it readies the new purple iPhone 12 and AirTags for launch. Both will be available for order from 5:00 a.m. Pacific Time or 8:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

Apple almost always takes its online store offline when it has a big product launch, although it has been known to just make new products live without the theater, too.

The two new products going live today are very different – one has been rumored for years, the other took us all by surprise. The new AirTag item tracker had been leaked into oblivion before it was officially announced during this week's Spring Forward event, while the purple iPhone 12 most certainly was not.

Apple Store Youre Early

Apple Store Youre Early (Image credit: iMore)

The AirTag tracker will be available for $29, while a four-pack will also be available for $99.

The purple iPhone 12 is identical to other iPhone 12 models and there's an iPhone 12 mini version to go with it as well. Both will sell for the same price as other colors as you might expect and you'll be able to order both online soon enough.

Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.