Hundreds queued up outside Apple stores in Sydney and Tokyo early on Friday as the latest iPhones went on sale.
Around 500 people waited for the opening of the Sydney store, the earliest to sell the iPhone 5S and 5C models.
But demand was apparently less than for earlier releases, after consumer analysts and investors expressed disappointment last week when Apple unveiled the two new models.
“Last year, I got here around the same time for the iPhone 5 and there was already a queue of around 20 people,” Jimmy Gunawan was quoted as saying by reporters.
This time he was first in line when he set up his stool outside the store at midday on Thursday.
In Japan, around 300 people were waiting outside the store of NTT Docomo Inc in Tokyo’s Marunouchi district near the central train station.
It was the first time Japan’s largest mobile carrier has offered the iPhone, after losing smartphone market share to rivals Softbank Corp and KDDI Corp, which have been offering the iPhones in the country since 2008 and 2011, respectively.
“We were the last to introduce the iPhone, but we aim to offer the best network and services for it,” NTT Docomo president Kaoru Kato told a news conference.
Hidenori Sato, who had been in line since Wednesday, was the first to get the 64-gigabyte iPhone 5s.
“This day finally came. I can’t put my feelings into words,” Sato was quoted by Kyoto News agency as saying.