Rumors are swirling about how the iPhone 15 Ultra could be the priciest iPhone ever made, with a price tag that could top $2,000 for the top-tier storage options. But that’s a drop in the bucket for the person who bought an original sealed iPhone from 2007 at an auction for more than $63,000.
The 8GB iPhone belonged to cosmetic tattoo artist Karen Green, who was gifted the new phone in 2007 by friends to celebrate starting a new job. Since she already had a brand-new phone at the time, she never opened the box, and now the iconic handset has earned her enough to buy more than 50 iPhone 14 Pros—$63,356.40 to be exact. That price includes a 20 percent “buyer’s premium,” so the actual winning bid was $52,797 excluding postage, insurance, and tax.
The original iPhone launched in 2007 in two sizes, 4GB for $499 and 8GB for $599, with a 3.5-inch display, no front camera, just 16 apps, and no app store. Of course, it quickly became a huge hit and one of the most influential electronic devices ever made, with several technologies that are commonplace today, including pinch to zoom and pull to refresh.
The winning bidder, who outbid 26 other people to win the lot, capped off a flurry of activity on the final day, which saw the bid price increase by more than $30,000. Unfortunately, they won’t be able to use it to do much since AT&T’s 2.5G Edge network has since been shuttered and it can’t be updated past iOS (iPhone OS) 3.1.3.
Author: Michael Simon, Executive Editor
Michael Simon has been covering Apple since the iPod was the iWalk. His obsession with technology goes back to his first PC—the IBM Thinkpad with the lift-up keyboard for swapping out the drive. He's still waiting for that to come back in style tbh.