Original, unopened iPhone sold for $63,000 at auction
Apple has released more than 2.24 billion iPhones since it unveiled the groundbreaking smartphone in 2007.
Now one of those original iPhones — still factory-sealed in its original box — has sold at an online auction for $63,356.40, according to news reports. That's more than 100 times the original $599 price.
The 8GB phone's owner, Karen Green, received it as a gift from friends, but already had another new phone so decided to keep it unopened.
“I didn't want to get rid of my phone, and I figured, ‘It's an iPhone, so it will never go out of date,' ” she said, according to CBS News. She had it appraised in 2019 at about $5,000.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone — the world's first smart phone — at the Macworld conference in San Francisco in January 2007; it went on sale five months later. It was revolutionary for combining
the functions of an iPod, cell phone and internet communicator in a single slim device.
“It's the best iPod we've ever made,” Jobs said at the time. “No matter what you like, it looks pretty doggone gorgeous.”
The phone sold online Sunday night by online auction house LCG Auctions drew 27 bids and set a record for the most paid for an original iPhone. “The original first-release iPhone in factory sealed
condition is widely regarded as a blue-chip asset amongst high-end collectors,” said the auction listing, which described the iPhone as “One of the most important and ubiquitous inventions of our lifetime.”
It doesn't even come close to being the most-expensive iPhone ever sold, however. That honor appears to belong to a custom iPhone 14 Pro Max from international brand Caviar. Encrusted with 511
diamonds and an inlaid snowflake made of diamonds and white gold, the “Diamond Snowflake” iPhone set you back a cool $533,000.
And if that's a stretch, Caviar offers a bargainbasement alternative: A similar-looking model that uses Swarovski crystals instead of diamonds. It's a mere $23,350.