New record: first-generation iPhone sells for over $190,000 at auction

One of Apple's first-generation iPhones sold for a new record-breaking price. Several of these phones, which hit the market in 2007, have been auctioned off recently and many of them have been sold for a lot of money. One example is Karen Green, an American tattoo artist who sold her first-generation iPhone for $63,356 last February. Prior to that, there was also a reported sale of another first-generation iPhone valued at $39,340 in October 2022.

However, the cell phone has now been sold for an even higher price. As reported by LCG Auctions, last Sunday, a first-generation iPhone was auctioned off for $190,373, almost 380 times the original price Apple was asking for its device in 2007, when the model cost $499.

An almost exclusive iPhone

The reason the iPhone was sold for so much money is that it is a model that could almost be considered exclusive. The auction house explained that this model of iPhone, with a storage capacity of up to 4GB, was far more exclusive than the 8GB model that Karen Green had put up for auction, even though Green's model was originally more expensive than the one recently sold ($599 compared to $499 in 2007 for the device that was auctioned off this past Sunday).

The reason why this cell phone was sold for more at auction is that it is the 4GB model. This iPhone was only available on the market for two months, as it was discontinued ahead of schedule when Apple realized that customers preferred devices with a larger memory size (8GB) over smaller ones (4GB).

This small difference helped this first-generation iPhone to sell for over $190,000. Mark Montero, founder of LCG Auctions is very proud: "A new bar was set Sunday night. We are thrilled to be a part of this fantastic record-breaking sale," he said in statements reported by AP.