Just as expected, T-Mobile today began accepting pre-orders for its version of the iPhone 5. Pricing starts out at a $99 down payment and 24 monthly payments of $20 each for the 16GB model and goes up to a $199 down payment for the 32GB version and a $299 down payment for the 64GB model, both of which also include the same 24 monthly $20 payments as the 16GB variant. Customers that'd prefer to pay for their new iPhone in full can expect to pony up $579.99, $679.99 and $779.99 for the 16GB, 32GB and 64GB models. The iPhone 5 will officially launch on T-Mobile on April 12.
Our friends at TmoNews note that the iPhone 5 requires one of T-Mobile's new Simple Choice Plans, so any Magenta folk that were hoping to sign up with a Classic or grandfathered plan will have to make the jump to one of T-Mo's new offerings. It's also worth pointing out that Apple doesn't appear to be selling the T-Mobile iPhone 5 on its website as of this writing. It's not clear when that'll change, but for now any T-Mobile subscribers that need to guarantee themselves a shiny new iPhone 5 will have to go through T-Mo's site to do so.
The arrival of the iPhone 5 (as well as the iPhone 4 and 4S) on T-Mobile's network means that all four big U.S. carriers are now selling Apple's smartphones, nearly five years after the original model launched exclusively on AT&T. This is good news for both companies involved, as Apple now has a handset on all of the major U.S. carriers, while T-Mobile may finally stop seeing customers leave for other operators just because it doesn't offer the iPhone.
While T-Mobile's Q1 2013 financial report won't include any iPhone sales, it'll be interesting to see what kind of numbers T-Mo puts up at the end of Q2 2013, at which point it'll have nearly three months of iPhone availability under its belt. How well do you think the T-Mobile iPhone models will sell? Will customers gobble them up now that T-Mobile officially has the iPhone, or will most folks hold out for a new model that may be coming this summer?
