iPhone 5 before the big announcement

Speculations about the iPhone 5 and its specifications arose shortly after the announcement of the iPhone 4S; both touchscreen-based smartphones developed by Apple Inc. However, detailed and substantial rumors and leaks did not come up until June 2012. As early as July 30, 2012, rumors pinpointed the exact date of announcement and release of the phone along with the speculated features of the phone.

On September 4, 2012, Apple sent invitations to a media event scheduled for September 12 at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA), a multidisciplinary contemporary arts center in the “City and County of San Francisco,” the leading financial and cultural center of Northern California and the San Francisco Bay Area of the United States (US). Many media sources speculated that the event would be related to the next iPhone due to a shadow of the numeral 5 that featured in the design of the invitations.

Apple announced a number of new products which they designed and marketed at the event including: the iPhone 5; iPod Nano (7th generation; stylized, and marketed as “iPod nano”), a portable media player; and the iPod Touch (5th generation; colloquially referred to as the “iTouch,” by analog to the iPhone), a portable media player, personal digital assistant, handheld game console, and Wi-Fi mobile device.

The phone will be available for pre-order from September 14, 2012 and available in-store on September 21, 2012 in the US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.

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