Some iPhone 18 Pro Max Owners Need a New Phone, Not a New Update

Apple confirmed that a number of iPhone 18 Pro Max units on AT&T in the United States lose cellular service completely. The signal bars turn into “SOS”, calls stop working, data stops working. iOS 27.0.1 prevents it from happening to phones that have not hit the bug yet. For the ones that already have, there is no update coming. Apple Support or AT&T replaces the handset.

That is the part worth sitting with. This is the most expensive phone in the line, and the fix is a trip to a store.

I have been watching this pattern for a few years now, and my own rule has hardened because of it: I do not buy a phone in its first weeks. Not this brand, not any brand. Something always comes out, a fix always follows, and the people who waited never find out. There is no prize for being first in the queue, and the cost of being wrong is the one device you need working every day.

The Pro Max is the only phone in the 18 line using a Qualcomm modem instead of Apple’s own. Apple has not said that is the cause, so I will not say it either. I will say what I think about the situation around it: this is exactly what test labs exist for. A company this size runs carrier certification programs. A bug that kills service entirely on one major network, on one specific model, is the kind of thing a test cycle is supposed to catch before a launch this big.

Could it happen to anyone? Yes. Chips are complicated, networks are complicated, and no amount of testing catches everything. That is a real defence, and it is also the reason the first weeks of any launch are a beta you pay full price to join.

So, do I buy it? Ask yourself one question: if this phone stopped working on your network next Tuesday, how much of your week would that break? If the answer is “most of it”, there is no version of this where buying on day one is the smart move. Wait a month. Read what happened to the people who did not.