Apple is expected to release the iPhone 6 later this year in 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch screen sizes, which are both significantly larger than the current 4-inch iPhone 5s. Apparently Apple is expecting the iPhone 6 to be bigger in others ways, too, as a new report claims that Apple is telling suppliers to manufacture a large number of units.

Sources speaking to The Wall Street Journal say that Apple has asked its suppliers to manufacture between 70 million and 80 million combined units of the 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch iPhone 6. To compare, Apple is said to have placed an initial order of 50 million to 60 million iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c units last year.

In addition to their larger displays, these new iPhone 6 models will reportedly feature “metal cases similar to the iPhone 5s.” The two phones are also expected to be available in multiple colors, though today’s report didn’t specify exactly which hues they’ll be available in. The iPhone 5s is sold in space gray, silver and gold colors.

As the screen sizes of Android and Windows Phone devices have continued to climb, Apple has stuck to the 4-inch screen size for the past couple of iPhone generations. Apparently now the company feels that the time is right to dramatically increase the iPhone’s screen size, though, a move that’s sure to please quite a few customers. Whether the screen size increase alone will be enough to win back consumers that’ve switched to other platforms for larger devices remains to be seen, but it seems that Apple is confident that that will be the case.

Which iPhone 6 model do you think that you’d rather have: the 4.7-inch version or the 5.5-incher?

Via The Wall Street Journal