Apple May Have Solved the Age-Old Preorder Problem

Preordering, or even ordering, popular new gadgets has never been easy. Websites crash under traffic loads, products disappear from shopping carts and sometimes you can get to the very last step of the checkout process, only to be mysteriously bounced back to the beginning. The good news is, if you want a new Apple iPhone 14 or iPhone 14 Pro, it may end being a little easier this time around. 

That's because Apple has updated its preorder process, now letting you go through every step of the purchase, right up to hitting the final button, before actual preorders start. Currently, you can go to Apple's website, choose your iPhone model, color, capacity, accessories and Apple Care options, and also add your billing and shipping information, then come back on Sept. 9 to hit that final button. At least, that's the plan. 

Read more: Here's How to Preorder the iPhone 14

This new system stood out to me because it wasn't that long ago I was on the warpath about preorders in general. In 2017, for the launch of the iPhone X, it seemed like everyone was stuck out in the cold. At the time I wrote: "Websites and apps stalled, crashed or hung; shopping carts mysteriously reset themselves; partner handshakes with carriers and financing companies failed. And that's on top of the entire iPhone-buying east coast of the US getting up at 3 a.m. to fight the online hordes. (West coasters had it easier, they only had to wait up until midnight.)" 

Read more: Preordering is Broken, and Here's How to Fix the System (2017)

And we had seen it all before, with everything from the Oculus Rift to the Nintendo Switch. Today's mad scramble for PS5 consoles is part of the same problem. Online shopping works fine, until everyone tries to buy the same thing at the same time. To add insult to injury, you can get stuck for 15 minutes or more in a pre-website queue to even get into an online store. 

Back in 2017, I suggested a longer preorder window, letting everyone get their carts set up and info entered, followed by (if demand outstrips supply) a simple random lottery to fulfill some set number of those preorders. From my 2017 proposal: 

"The sudden start of preorders for a hard-to-get gadget becomes a set preorder window shared by all. Now there's no reason for everyone to rush a website or app at the same time, which inevitably crashes it or causes slowdowns or errors. Just log in anytime over the course of 24 hours, 72 hours, a full week, whatever the agreed-upon term is…Once the preorder window closes, the seller (Apple, Nintendo, Amazon, whatever...) applies a random number generator to the applications and assigns inventory, or the best ship dates, to the first X names drawn from a virtual hat…You're at least as likely to get as good spot on the preorder list this way as you would from resubmitting the same order every time the website crashes at 3 am." 

With the current preorder system for the iPhone 14, Apple has come close to putting my theory into practice. Will it cut down on crashes and lost carts? We'll have to check back on Sept. 9 to find out for sure, but I suspect it'll beat the old way of doing things.