Apple's own sites say iPhone Duo walk-in sales are off in Japan and South Korea, and the iPhone 18 Pro Max tooApple's own sites say iPhone Duo walk-in sales are off in Japan and South Korea, and the iPhone 18 Pro Max too

Apple has posted notices on its Japanese and Korean websites saying the iPhone Duo and the iPhone 18 Pro Max cannot be bought at its stores there without ordering ahead.

MacRumors reported the notices on 19 October, four days before the Duo goes on sale on Friday 23 October. The Apple Post says the Japanese blog Mac Otakara highlighted the Japanese one in a post on X. Until then, the only word on walk-in sales of the Duo had come from inside the stores: two days earlier, MacRumors' Hartley Charlton had reported that some store staff were told to warn customers off coming in without a pre-order, which was guidance passed to employees rather than anything Apple published.

What do the two notices say?

We read both pages on 19 October. They are not worded the same way, and the difference matters to anyone planning a trip to a store.

• Japan: a banner on Apple's iPhone page says that for a while, the newest iPhone Duo and iPhone 18 Pro Max cannot be bought at a nearby Apple Store without a reservation. No end date is given.
• South Korea: the banner first invites customers to buy online and have it delivered free or pick it up at an Apple Store, then says both phones cannot currently be bought in person at Apple Store. It does not mention reservations or a date.

So in Japan a reservation gets you through the door, while in Korea the route Apple points to is an online order, delivered or collected in store. Neither notice mentions carriers or other resellers. On Apple's buy pages the same day, the 256GB iPhone Duo was ¥364,800 in Japan, tax included, and ₩3,290,000 in Korea.

Does it apply anywhere else?

Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said on X on 18 October, as quoted by The Apple Post, that China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea carried the same message but for the iPhone 18 Pro Max only. That no longer matches the Korean page, which named both phones when we read it a day later. On the Chinese, Hong Kong and Taiwanese iPhone pages we found no such banner at all that day. Either Apple has been changing the notices market by market, or they sit on pages we did not check; we report what the pages showed.

On its US, UK, German and French iPhone pages, Apple had posted nothing of the kind when we read them on 19 October. MacRumors says Apple's online store tells shoppers to check back on Saturday 24 October for in-store pickup, and Charlton reported that pickup reservations were briefly offered when pre-orders opened, then switched off.

Our take

Putting the iPhone 18 Pro Max on the same notice is the detail that tells us most. We read its inclusion as a measure against resellers rather than a supply problem: a reservation ties each phone to a named buyer, which makes it harder for one person to buy several and export them. The resale market Apple would be guarding against is real. iPhone Duo pre-orders sold on eBay for up to $5,000 within a day, about $1,800 over Apple's price for that model.

For buyers in Japan, the practical step is to watch Apple's reservation page from 24 October, when Apple's online store says to check back on pickup, rather than queue on launch day. In Korea, the route Apple names is an online order, delivered free or collected in store. Everywhere else, APPDOOK would not travel to a store on 23 October without an order in hand. Apple has now said in writing in two countries what store staff were told privately, and Gurman reported on 11 October that stock would stay limited even after Apple built enough for launch. The demo tables will be full; the stockroom probably will not.

The US is the one to watch next. If Apple's American pages carry a similar banner before Friday, walk-in buyers there will know where they stand. If they do not, the guidance to staff is still the best signal anyone has.