---
title: "Which came first, Facebook or the iPhone?"
description: "Facebook vs the iPhone: Facebook came first, by 3 years — 2004 against 2007. What happened in each case, and why the dates are often given differently."
url: https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/facebook-vs-iphone/
site: "At One Place"
---

# Which came first, Facebook or the iPhone?

**Which came first, Facebook or the iPhone?: Facebook**

2004 — 3 years before the iPhone

Facebook came first, by 3 years. TheFacebook launched for Harvard students only.

## Side by side

|  | Facebook | the iPhone |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Year | 2004 | 2007 |
| Date | 2004-02-04 | 2007-06-29 |
| Category | technology | technology |
| What happened | TheFacebook launched for Harvard students only. | The first iPhone went on sale after a January announcement. |

## Facebook

Facebook launched on 4 February 2004 restricted to Harvard email addresses, opened to other universities through 2004 and 2005, and to anyone over 13 with an email address in September 2006. It is six years younger than Google and a year older than YouTube. Its predecessor Facemash, which compared students' photographs, was shut down by the university within days in 2003.

## the iPhone

Announced on 9 January 2007 and on sale from 29 June, the first iPhone had no app store, no copy and paste, no 3G and no video recording. The App Store arrived over a year later in July 2008. Android Inc. had been founded in 2003, four years before the iPhone, but the first Android phone shipped fifteen months after it.

## Common questions

### Which came first, Facebook or the iPhone?

Facebook, by 3 years — 2004 against 2007.

### When did Facebook start?

2004. TheFacebook launched for Harvard students only.

### When did the iPhone start?

2007. The first iPhone went on sale after a January announcement.

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## Sources

- Wikidata — Wikimedia Foundation (https://www.wikidata.org/) [CC0 1.0]