Foxconn has begun recruiting assembly workers in Ganzhou and Longhua for Apple's first foldable screen iPhone, and the 10 million unit target is the third upward revision in weeks, more than triple June's figure.
Apple has tripled its first-year foldable-screen iPhone production target in a matter of weeks, with the latest revision visible in Foxconn recruitment notices posted in Ganzhou and Longhua on July 6 and 7.
Ganzhou Foxconn published a WeChat hiring notice on July 7 seeking workers aged 18 to 50 for precision component production and machining tied to Apple devices, according to ithome citing Shanghai Securities News. A day earlier, Foxconn's HR account began recruiting temporary workers at the Longhua and Guanlan campuses, covering the Apple A business group and the San Ying business group. Both divisions are tied to foldable iPhone assembly in NetEase's account and Sina's report.
Apple has now told suppliers to prepare roughly 10 million foldable iPhones for 2026, the third upward revision in roughly four weeks. CNBC on July 2 cited people familiar with the matter for the 10 million figure. That number sits above the 7 to 8 million forecast carried by Nikkei Asia and republished by The Standard, and well above the roughly 3 million target that Forbes' Jay McGregor notes was cited only weeks earlier. The cadence of revisions is consistent with supply-chain gates clearing faster than a cautious base case assumed, with internal demand planning catching up to factory capacity.
Samsung's combined Galaxy Z Fold 8 production target for the year sits at 5 to 6 million units, per Forbes. If Apple ships anywhere near 10 million in its debut foldable year, it would deliver roughly twice Samsung's annual foldable output, a category Samsung has owned since 2019. Against a 2026 iPhone production plan that CNBC puts at more than 220 million units, the foldable still looks small at roughly 4 to 5 percent of mix. A 10 million-unit first year, however, is not a cautious-debut volume.
Apple is adding Chinese memory makers CXMT and YMTC to the foldable iPhone bill of materials alongside Samsung and SK hynix, per CNBC, a response to foldable-specific memory tightness rather than a swap-out of the established dual-vendor stack. Adding Chinese suppliers to a flagship Apple device remains a notable supply-chain step, even if the volumes are still a small share of the total.
Nikkei Asia, via The Standard, places the foldable inside a wider 2026-2027 lineup refresh: Apple is preparing five new iPhone models by 2027, with the foldable arriving as one entry rather than a standalone experiment. The original 36kr roundup that pulled these signals together is here.
Apple has not publicly confirmed the foldable iPhone. The 10 million figure follows the people-familiar pattern typical of supply-chain leaks rather than corporate guidance. Foxconn's recruitment posts are direct company signals, but the foldable-iPhone assignment is inferred from the divisions involved rather than stated in the hiring notices themselves. Samsung's 5 to 6 million Z Fold 8 target is also a forecast, not shipped volume.
Foxconn's temporary worker lines run through August, and supplier checks resume in September. Those are the two markers that will confirm whether the 10 million target has held. If it does, the foldable iPhone will arrive as a category-expanding launch rather than a cautious debut, and Samsung's premium-niche positioning of the form factor will need to be revised.