Apple’s iPhone 6s and 6s Plus pre-order sales began on Sunday and NetEase Tech reports China has seen strong demand for Apple’s latest smartphones.
According to an iPhone inventory blog, which tracks the back-order status of iPhones, the estimated wait time for the Apple Store website to deliver all models of iPhone 6s Plus will be three to four weeks whilst the iPhone 6s will take about two to three weeks.
The blog also compared the status of other iPhone first-launch countries, the U.K., U.S., Japan and Canada. Most models of the iPhone 6s will be available to deliver on September 25, but the iPhone 6s Plus will take about three to four weeks.
Industry website jiemian.com reported that the Chinese Apple store website was down for two hours prior to the beginning of the pre-ordering which began on Sunday at 3pm Beijing time.
A screenshot of the Apple.com.cn website was shown on Jiemian.com displaying, “Access denied. You don’t have permission to access ‘http://www.apple.com.cn on this server.”
Jiemian said the error was caused by too many visitors attempting to log onto the site to pre-order the iPhone, overloading the server.
Kantar Worldpanel ComTech’s earlier report said that the iPhone had 27.6 percent of the Chinese smartphone market by the end of February with momentum to grow. Meanwhile, Apple’s share of the smartphone market has declined in major developed countries including the U.S., Japan and Germany in January and February.