T-Mobile to get iPhone 3GS in place of iPhone 4 later this year?

September 8, 2010 By Ryan Fleming

Wired editor Chris Anderson has heard that the iPhone 4 will not be coming to T-Mobile anytime soon, but the iPhone 3GS might be on the way later this year.

We all know that the tech rumor mill is one of the most well-oiled of all the rumor mills, and when you throw Apple into the mix, simple comments can take on a life of their own. An aside between two people can end up on the front page news, and while the rumor itself might last just long enough for another rumor to replace it, every now and then, the truth manages to squeeze through the stories. Whether or not this is one of those case remains to be seen, but it does have a certain logic to it.

We’ve been hearing rumors that the iPhone might soon be heading to T-Mobile. If you have been following the iPhone, odds are you are slightly desensitized to “the iPhone is going to ____” stories (looking at you Verizon). Apple will take the iPhone to multiple carriers eventually — it needs to in order to expand — but the contract with AT&T that once seemed like a wildly one-sided affair in favor of Apple, is now looking more like pair of handcuffs keeping the iPhone with AT&T, thanks to some hefty penalties for Apple if they break the contract before it expires in 2012. If the recent tweet by Wired editor, Chris Anderson, is correct, then maybe Apple has found a loophole.

“A T-Mobile manager casually mentioned to me that they’re going to get the iPhone 3GS (but not 4, oddly) later this year. Common knowledge?” Anderson tweeted.

Now again, this could be a rumor passed on from the T-Mobile manager, the guy may simply have gotten his facts wrong, or something else entirely. And if it turns out to be true, there could be reasons for the 3GS debuting on T-Mobile that we don’t yet know, but it all has a certain logic to it. If it is true, we should expect to hear more about this soon in order to get T-Mobile ready for the holidays.

Showing 7 comments

Yo Ho at 10:01am 20th September 2010 this sounds like a joke to me. i've been with tmobile forever, and have wanted an iphone for yrs.. except i wasnt willing to shell out so much more money every month. sticking with them proved the right decision, even if i am iphone-less. TMobile is set to release a 4G phone later this yr.. so it makes no sense that they'd get the old ones. My guess is that iphone is stuck and by the time their contract with AT&T is up, another mega popular phone will be released elsewhere. remember when the motorola razr debuted? it was the same thing. only they didnt sign a retarded 5 yr exclusivity clause.
1. Joe at 2:25pm 5th June 2011 iPhone is best cellphone out there! Any android OS base phone. They get laggy with time. Although it. Does cost and arm & leg with AT&T!
Jim at 11:13am 10th September 2010 Getting the 3GS and not the 4 would be the dumbest thing T-Mobile would ever do. Do you think ATT would start selling the G1 now? I can not envision T-Mobile or any other company doing such a thing.
Jon Heine at 2:10pm 8th September 2010 Yah, T-Mobile is getting an an iPhone, wait a second, T-Mobile is getting the old iPhones?? What kind of bs is that, lol oh yeah I'm not with T-Mobile anymore so hopefully T-Mobile will get the original iPhone from 3 years ago that Apple just dusted off. T-Mobile sucks and treated me like crap after 9 years with them so F?!@$ T-Mobile, no customer loyalty at all.
yearite at 12:13pm 8th September 2010 a t-mobile manager let it leak.......puleeze. if a store manager is aware of this information, the entire whirled would be, I vote for rumor
ioman at 10:06am 8th September 2010 If this is the case, it would validate T-Mobile as a 3rd tier cell phone service provider and put them in the same bracket as Cricket and Boost Mobile. Why would they accept an old phone? That's just dumb.
Greg at 9:31am 8th September 2010 T-Mobile gets AT&T's hand-me-downs