Apple Starts Preview Rollout of the Apple Card

The Apple Card is here. Well, almost.

The company’s new credit card built in partnership with Goldman Sachs is being rolled out to a select a number of users in the United States today. The new credit card will be available to all iPhone users later this month.

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Apple Card is obviously Apple’s own-branded credit card that is heavily integrated into the iPhone. If you don’t have an iPhone, you can’t even apply to get the card, to begin with. I suggest reading our earlier article about Apple Card if you don’t already know what it is. Either way, Apple is starting the preview rollout today, and it’s selected a random group of users to start the preview with. You will need to submit some personal details like your income and your social security number, which is then checked by Goldman Sachs and you are notified whether your application has been accepted. The whole application can be done through the Wallet app on iOS. You will, however, need iOS 12.4 for this to work.

Apple has released a whole bunch of tutorial videos to show off how the Apple Card works, and that will be essential for new users. The method to activate your titanium Apple Card that comes with the card itself is pretty cool, by the way:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdYXLUjwPhc

Apple isn’t saying exactly when the Apple Card will be available to all users yet, though considering we are almost 10 days into August, that shouldn’t be too far away.

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Conversation 14 comments

  • skane2600

    06 August, 2019 - 10:02 am

    <p>Got to love that ad. Like saying "This is a new kind of medical procedure created by a guy down the street, not a doctor.</p>

    • Chris Payne

      06 August, 2019 - 1:04 pm

      <blockquote><em><a href="#447563">In reply to skane2600:</a></em></blockquote><p>While I totally get your point, there will be lots of people who view this as Apple coming in to disrupt another industry. And honestly, the credit card industry could probably use some shake up. Not that I really expect either of these two things to happen, but who knows?</p>

      • skane2600

        06 August, 2019 - 1:19 pm

        <blockquote><em><a href="#447609">In reply to unkinected:</a></em></blockquote><p>Yeah, meet the new APR same as the old APR.</p>

  • jchampeau

    Premium Member
    06 August, 2019 - 10:28 am

    <p>Remember when Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 97 and cut all the extraneous and distracting projects so Apple could focus on a small number products and make them really good? This seems like an extraneous and distracting project to me. The iPod was innovative and started a revolutionary shift in how we store, carry, and buy music, the iPhone changed how we communicate and stay connected, the iPad made tablets mainstream. But this is….a credit card with a rewards program that doesn't interest me in the slightest.</p>

    • Patrick3D

      06 August, 2019 - 11:02 am

      <blockquote><a href="#447572"><em>In reply to jchampeau:</em></a></blockquote><p>Unlike Apple Pay, Apple Card can be used anywhere that MasterCard is accepted. That means every purchase made with it in a physical store generates a fee that the store has to pay that goes to Goldman Sachs which no doubt is being split with Apple. Whereas a Mac sits in a warehouse or store shelf until it is sold, this Apple Card is going to generate revenue for Apple from every little purchase made with it anywhere on Earth. Pennies x millions of transactions, every-single-day of the week. Steve Jobs would be salivating at the windfall of revenue, he loved locking people into an ecosystem and trapping them there.</p>

    • lvthunder

      Premium Member
      06 August, 2019 - 11:07 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#447572">In reply to jchampeau:</a></em></blockquote><p>So you think the person making the credit card would be the same person making some other sort of hardware? Are you kidding me? Apple is a lot bigger of a company now then they were in 97.</p><p><br></p><p>Just because it doesn't interest you doesn't mean it's not a good move for Apple to make.</p>

      • jchampeau

        Premium Member
        06 August, 2019 - 11:48 am

        <blockquote><em><a href="#447582">In reply to lvthunder:</a></em></blockquote><p>Both of you are missing the point. Of course the credit card will make them money. And in the 90s the only thing keeping them from bankruptcy was a cash infusion from Microsoft, so to say they're a "lot bigger" now is quite the understatement. The point is product sprawl and entering new unrelated lines of business where there's little room for actual innovation has the potential to make them stop innovating and just become protectionist. I think they should have carried on with electric cars. Clearly there's room there to shake things up and really compete with Tesla. But credit cards? There's nothing exciting or innovative to do there. The Apple Card website says "<span style="background-color: rgb(250, 250, 250); color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">It’s the first card that actually encourages you to pay less&nbsp;interest" which isn't true. My Amex charge card "encourages" me to pay no interest because they bill is due in full each month, and my Citi Double Cash card encourages me to pay less interest by paying me a 1% reward on purchases when I pay the bill in addition to the 1% reward I earn as I make purchases.</span></p>

        • lvthunder

          Premium Member
          06 August, 2019 - 3:00 pm

          <blockquote><em><a href="#447587">In reply to jchampeau:</a></em></blockquote><p>Does your Amex card or your citi card do all the things the Apple Card does with giving each vendor a different number automatically. I doubt it. Also they are talking about the prompts in the Apple Card app. It's a whole lot different then the AmEx app.</p><p><br></p><p>Being a bigger company means they can do more things at the same time.</p><p><br></p><p>We also really don't know what they are doing in the car space. I don't trust every bit of speculation and rumors is truthful.</p>

          • jchampeau

            Premium Member
            06 August, 2019 - 3:41 pm

            <blockquote><em><a href="#447634">In reply to lvthunder:</a></em></blockquote><p>The Apple Card doesn't give each vendor a different number automatically. </p><p><br></p><p><a href="https://www.macrumors.com/guide/apple-card/&quot; target="_blank">Source</a></p><p><br></p><p>From the article: "<span style="color: rgb(4, 20, 39);">There is not, however, support for single-use numbers or single-merchant numbers for having separate card numbers for different merchants."</span></p>

          • sandy

            06 August, 2019 - 7:47 pm

            <blockquote><em><a href="#447634">In reply to lvthunder:</a></em></blockquote><p>Google Pay already hides your real card credit card number from merchants.</p>

        • steenmachine

          06 August, 2019 - 3:31 pm

          <blockquote><em><a href="#447587">In reply to jchampeau:</a></em></blockquote><p><br></p><p>The CC will make them money, sure.</p><p><br></p><p>You mention iPod, iPhone, iPad above, but Apple is not just a hardware company. Along with Goog and MS, they innovate on the software side. The card and all of its "stuff" integrated into the phone/ecosystem seems like a natural extension of them pushing Apple Pay for a few years now. We'll see if it's successful or not. </p><p><br></p><p>And it's not supposed to be your only card. I have a couple that are optimal in different scenarios (groceries, travel, etc). But a card that has no fees, protects my info, shows detailed information on what's been bought and where, and gives instantaneous 2% back on contactless payments, seems quite the value prop. If you're an iPhone owner, why wouldn't you apply? </p><p><br></p>

  • mclark2112

    Premium Member
    06 August, 2019 - 1:26 pm

    <p>So is Apple acting as the Bank for this card? If so, they are making 20-30% on their investment, sounds good for them to me.</p>

    • Saxwulf

      Premium Member
      06 August, 2019 - 1:59 pm

      <blockquote><em><a href="#447614">In reply to mclark2112:</a></em></blockquote><p>Goldman Sachs.</p>

  • wolf

    Premium Member
    09 August, 2019 - 1:19 pm

    <p>"Created by Apple, not a bank" … unless you count Goldman Sachs.</p>

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