iPhone Ultra Price Leaks Follow the iPhone X Script

Vodafone Egypt listed Apple’s foldable iPhone Ultra at 155,750 pounds, a little over $3,000 at the window rate. The page went up with a notify-me button, then came down. Measured against the same shop’s iPhone 17 Pro Max at 94,400 pounds, the step is 65 percent, which maps to about $1,980 on a $1,199 US Pro Max, not $3,000.

A second leak, from Australia, puts the 256GB Ultra at AUD 3,699 ($2,663). That is the old iPhone X move in new clothes: a halo that looks punishing once you convert it, and a round US number once you compare it with the phone it is meant to sit above.

Vodafone Egypt Listed the Ultra at 155,750 Pounds

Yousif Ayman, who posted the Egypt page, caught the Ultra under that name before Vodafone pulled it. The listing treated the foldable as a real SKU, not a rumor blog, which is why the screenshot moved as fast as it did. Raw pound-to-dollar math is what traveled first, and it is the wrong tool for a market that already taxes and marks up every iPhone.

THE EGYPT STICKER

• Ultra ticket: 155,750 Egyptian pounds on the Vodafone page that was taken down.
• 17 Pro Max: 94,400 pounds for the current 256GB halo on the same carrier.
• The step: 65 percent, or 61,350 pounds, over that Pro Max.
• Status: the Ultra URL is gone; the 17-series shop pages are still live.

The current iPhone 17 Pro shop listing is the useful baseline, not the converted $3,000. A 256GB iPhone 17 Pro sits at 88,800 pounds there. Anyone who has bought an iPhone in Cairo already knows the US MSRP is a different product from the number on the carrier site.

98,000 Pounds Is the Leaked iPhone 18 Pro

The same Egypt pass also priced the rest of the September stack. Vodafone had the iPhone 18 Pro at 98,000 pounds and the iPhone 18 Pro Max at 105,000 pounds. Against this year’s 88,800 and 94,400, that is a 10 percent hike on Pro and 11 percent on Pro Max, the kind of step Apple can blame on parts rather than on a new shape.

TrendForce says memory costs for a 256GB iPhone 18 Pro are set to run nearly 400 percent higher year on year in the third quarter, which is why a 10 to 20 percent lift across the new Pros is the working range. If that $100-style bump holds in the US, the 18 Pro Max lands around $1,299. The Ultra is doing something else. It is not a parts-cost tweak. It is a new ceiling.

Why a Straight Dollar Conversion Overshoots

Apply the Egypt 65 percent step to the US iPhone 17 Pro Max at $1,199 and you get about $1,980. Apply an 80 percent premium to the $1,099 17 Pro, the method circulating with the leaks, and you get about $1,999. Australia’s 256GB Ultra at AUD 3,699 sits 68 percent above the local 17 Pro Max at AUD 2,199, and 85 percent above the 17 Pro at AUD 1,999. Both paths still round to a $2,000 US start if Apple keeps its usual.99 ending.

THE LEAKED TICKETS AGAINST THE IPHONE 17 LINE

The Australian storage ladder is the tell that a $2,000 floor is not the price most Ultra buyers will pay. AUD 4,200 and AUD 4,700 for 512GB and 1TB are the configs that will drag the mix up, which is how IDC can talk about an average selling price of $2,550 even if the US start is a round two thousand. Strip Australia’s 10 percent GST and convert again, and some of the math still sits nearer $2,500 than $2,000. The $2,000 figure is the American sticker. It is not the ticket in Cairo or Sydney.

The iPhone X Made This Jump First

Apple has already run this exact argument. On September 12, 2017, it put the iPhone X on stage at $999 for 64GB and $1,149 for 256GB, then made people wait until November 3 to buy one. The US number was the headline. The foreign numbers were the bill. Britain paid £999, about $1,330 at the time. Germany paid €1,149, about $1,376. Australia paid AUD 1,579, about $1,267. The gap was the point of a “super premium” that also slowed demand while the new OLED build caught up.

HOW APPLE HAS MOVED THE CEILING

1. June 2007: The first iPhone opens at $499 in the US.
2. September 12, 2017: iPhone X opens at $999, with pre-orders on October 27 and shipping on November 3.
3. September 9, 2025: iPhone 17 Pro Max holds $1,199 for 256GB and reaches $1,999 at 2TB.
4. September 9, 2026: iPhone Ultra is due on stage as the first Apple foldable, with a leaked step of 65 to 68 percent over the current Pro Max.

The X was also the last time Apple asked the market to accept a new shape and a new price on the same day, then shipped the hard model late. Apple reporter Mark Gurman, who has followed the foldable project for years, said he would be surprised if this one slipped into late October or November. He still expects it with the Pro phones, or within weeks. Even a same-week ship date can ration a halo. A limited Ultra supply that echoes the iPhone X would do the same job the $999 tag and the November queue once did, without needing a delay speech.

Gurman Will Not Pretend Anyone Needs It

Gurman is not selling the Ultra as a tool you lack. He is selling it as a want, priced like one. He is sticking to $2,000 or above, and he notes that the 2TB 17 Pro Max already sits at $1,999, so the foldable’s storage ladder will live in that band from the first SKU.

I couldn’t tell you with a straight face that you need to spend $2,000 plus on a phone because it has a super advanced hinge and the ability to open to the size of an iPad.

Mark Gurman, Apple reporter, in a Tom’s Guide interview

He called it “the ultimate flex, the ultimate status symbol phone.” The hardware rumor that rides with that line is a 5.5-inch cover and a 7.8-inch inner panel, a wide book that Apple will pitch for video, a big viewfinder, and games you hold like a pad. The crease is not gone. Durability, including a rumored liquid-metal hinge, is the spec he says Apple actually obsessed over. TrendForce still models a starting price of $2,099 to $2,299, with the top configs above $3,000, and it expects foldables to stay around 2 percent of global phone shipments in 2026. IDC has the Ultra above 10 million units in year one anyway. Those two forecasts can both be true if the buyer is the person Gurman described, not the person who needs a new Pro Max.

Foldables at $1,900 Already Exist

A $2,000 Apple start does not invent the foldable price band. It parks Apple on top of it. Samsung opened the Galaxy Z Fold 7 in the US at $2,000 for 256GB, $2,120 for 512GB, and $2,420 for 1TB, then spent the following year discounting the floor. Launch pricing on the Galaxy Z Fold 8 has been put at $1,900. The leaked Ultra 256GB is the first Apple phone that has to win against those tickets, not against last year’s Pro Max.

WHAT A $2,000 FOLDABLE IS UP AGAINST

• Galaxy Z Fold 7, 256GB: $2,000 at US launch, later sold well below that on no-trade-in deals.
• Galaxy Z Fold 7, 1TB: $2,420 at launch, the SKU that already lives where Ultra’s high-storage leaks sit.
• Galaxy Z Fold 8: $1,900 at launch in the comparison circulating with the Vodafone math.
• Ultra 256GB, leak-implied US: about $1,980 to $1,999 if the 65 to 80 percent step holds.

Counterpoint has Apple taking a quarter of foldable shipments in 2026, with Samsung’s share sliding from 40 percent to 32 percent. That is a mix shift, not a volume war. Apple does not need the Ultra to be cheaper than a discounted Fold 7. It needs the Ultra to be the status object Gurman named, in enough colors and shops that the 10 million IDC units can be the flex layer on top of the Pro stack.

Ternus Has to Name a Price on September 9

John Ternus, Apple’s chief executive since September 1, hosts his first launch on September 9. The invite line is Surprise and Shine, a special Apple Event on September 9 at 10 a.m. PT, streamed from Apple Park. The iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max are expected beside the foldable. A leaked Australian page named September 12 for pre-orders; that date is still a carrier placeholder, not Apple’s.

WHAT WE KNOW

• The Egypt number: 155,750 pounds appeared on Vodafone and was removed.
• The ratio: 65 percent over Egypt’s 17 Pro Max, 68 percent over Australia’s, both pointing near $2,000 in the US.
• The event: September 9, 10 a.m. PT, Ternus’s first keynote.
• The pitch: Gurman says nobody needs it, and Apple will sell video, a viewfinder, and a hinge.

WHAT IS UNCONFIRMED

• US MSRP: leak math says about $2,000; TrendForce models $2,099 to $2,299; nothing is on an Apple page.
• Ship day: Gurman expects the Ultra with the Pros or close to it; a later queue is still possible.
• The listing itself: it may be a placeholder, a tax-on price, or a wrong SKU that a carrier clerk published too soon.

The split launch of Ultra and the Pro phones only works if the foldable is expensive on purpose. A 10 percent Pro hike keeps the workhorse in reach. A 65 percent Ultra hike rebuilds the halo the Pro Max lost when 2TB already cost $1,999. On September 9, Ternus has to say which of those numbers is the real one, and which was only Vodafone doing Apple’s pricing out loud.