Jefferies analyst Edison Lee said Apple’s rumored all-glass iPhone, expected to mark the device’s 20th anniversary and once targeted for a September 2027 launch, has been canceled after his firm’s supply-chain checks found poor production yields.
As a result, Jefferies downgraded Apple stock to “Underperform” from “Hold” and cut its price target to $263.66 from $285.56. Apple shares fell 2.1% following the downgrade.
Why the all-glass iPhone was reportedly canceled
Lee’s analysis pointed to poor production yield — the rate at which manufacturing produces defect-free units — as the primary reason the project was scrapped.
The all-glass iPhone had been touted since at least 2025 as the most significant redesign since the iPhone X and was expected to debut in fall 2027 alongside a second-generation foldable iPhone. Reports described a curved glass panel wrapping around front and back with virtually no cutouts in the display, along with under-display Face ID and solid-state buttons.
Lee had previously viewed the all-glass design as a plausible upcoming release; its apparent cancellation changes his view of Apple’s ability to push higher iPhone prices. He called the move a major setback for increasing prices as memory costs climb and estimated that, had it launched in 2027, the device would have carried a blended retail price of around $2,060.
Beyond a single model, Lee said Apple had planned to bring all-glass styling to the iPhone Pro and Pro Max lines to raise average selling price and margins. He also cited Apple’s AI strategy and rising component costs for the “iPhone 19 Pro Max,” expected in 2027, as additional factors behind the downgrade, arguing the slow rollout of Apple Intelligence makes it harder to justify equipping more iPhones with the extra RAM needed to run AI models on-device.
What remains uncertain about the 20th-anniversary design
It is unclear whether Lee was describing the end of the entire 20th-anniversary redesign or only its all-glass display component. Observers have repeatedly questioned whether Apple can eliminate the Dynamic Island given the engineering hurdles involved, which suggests a genuinely seamless glass front may never have been realistic regardless of yield and cost. Even so, other elements of the rumored redesign, including a quad-curved chassis, could still be on track.
