Three days after Apple’s September 9 event, iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max have complete spec sheets, a full price grid and open pre-orders. What they do not have, on any Apple page we can find, is a per-device AppleCare+ price, a repair cost, or a number for the gap between the carrier-connected price and the unlocked one. This is the ledger of what remains unpublished for both phones as pre-orders continue.
Pre-orders opened at 12:00 UTC on September 12, and both phones reach stores Friday, September 18, so these are the gaps a buyer would actually hit this week, not a wish list for later. For the specs Apple has confirmed, see our iPhone 18 Pro launch coverage.
What Apple has confirmed for both phones
Apple’s tech specs and Store pages carry the chip, camera, display, color and price detail in full for both models, down to the per-tier price at every storage size. The two phones share the A20 Pro chip, the same four colors and the same four storage tiers, and differ mainly in screen size, weight and battery rating. Our 18 Pro versus Pro Max comparison covers what does separate them.
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| Key fact | iPhone 18 Pro | iPhone 18 Pro Max |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price, 256GB | $1,199 with carrier connectivity, $1,299 unlocked | $1,299 with carrier connectivity, $1,399 unlocked |
| Chip | A20 Pro, Apple’s first 2-nanometer chip | A20 Pro |
| Display | 6.3-inch | 6.9-inch |
| Colors | Black, Silver, Glacier, Burgundy | Same four colors |
| Pre-orders | Open since 12:00 UTC, September 12 | Open since 12:00 UTC, September 12 |
| In stores | Friday, September 18 | Friday, September 18 |
The AppleCare+ and repair price gap
Apple’s AppleCare+ pricing tables carry rows for iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, but the monthly and annual figures load client-side, and that script is not serving a price for either phone. The only coverage figures Apple has actually published this week are AppleCare One at $19.99 a month for up to three devices and the new AppleCare One Family at $49.99 a month, and neither is a per-device iPhone 18 Pro price. Apple’s own releases confirm that AppleCare+ and AppleCare One plans are available for the new phones; they do not say what either costs per device.
Repair pricing sits in the same gap. Apple has published marketing pages, a press release and a full tech specs sheet for iPhone 18 Pro, but its support library, the part of apple.com that normally carries an out-of-warranty screen or battery repair price, has no iPhone 18 Pro entry yet. The iPhone manuals index still lists the iPhone 17 family and iPhone Air as its newest models.
The trade-in and carrier price gap
Apple’s own trade-in wording is a range, not a table: an iPhone 13 or later gets $175 to $885 in credit toward a new purchase. Apple has not published a per-model trade-in figure anywhere; its trade-in page routes every visitor to a condition questionnaire instead of a price list.
The connectivity discount is the other unstated number. iPhone 18 Pro runs $1,199 with a carrier selected at checkout and $1,299 unlocked, and Pro Max runs $1,299 and $1,399 on the same pattern, but Apple’s own footnote describes the discount only in words: it applies to customers who connect with a carrier at the time of purchase. The $100 gap itself never appears as a figure on any Apple page, in the press release or in the footnote that explains it.
The carbon and documentation gap
Apple does publish a carbon figure for both phones: 63 kg of CO2e for a 256GB iPhone 18 Pro, rising to 109 kg for the 2TB model, with the Pro Max running a few kilograms higher at every tier. It appears only in the Product Environmental Report PDF for this launch, never on the iphone-18-pro product page or in the press release itself. A reader who checks only the page Apple links from the Store will not find it.
| Not published, for either phone | Where it would normally appear |
|---|---|
| Per-device AppleCare+ price | AppleCare+ pricing table (loads blank for this model) |
| Out-of-warranty repair price | Apple’s support library (no iPhone 18 Pro entry yet) |
| Per-model trade-in value | Trade-in page (states only a $175 to $885 range) |
| The $100 connectivity gap, as a figure | Store footnote (describes it, never states the number) |
| Carbon footprint on the product page | iphone-18-pro product page (figure exists only in the PER PDF) |
| iPhone 18 Pro user manual | Support manuals index (newest listed model is iPhone 17) |
What Apple has not said
Apple has not said when the AppleCare+ tables will populate a price, when a support-library page will cover iPhone 18 Pro repairs, or whether the $100 connectivity gap will ever be stated as a number rather than described in a footnote. None of the six items above is evidence that the page will stay blank; each one closes the moment Apple updates a single page, the way the price grid and spec sheet already have been. Our coverage of the September 9 event and the iPhone 18 Pro price breakdown cover what Apple has said in full.
Pre-orders continue through the week, with both phones reaching stores Friday, September 18. Anyone checking for AppleCare+ pricing or a repair estimate before then should expect Apple’s support library, not this ledger, to be where it eventually shows up.