---
title: "Which came first, the iPhone or Python?"
description: "the iPhone vs Python: Python came first, by 16 years — 1991 against 2007. What happened in each case, and why the dates are often given differently."
url: https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/iphone-vs-python/
site: "At One Place"
---

# Which came first, the iPhone or Python?

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

1991 — 16 years before the iPhone

Python came first, by 16 years. Guido van Rossum released version 0.9.0 publicly.

## Side by side

|  | the iPhone | Python |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Year | 2007 | 1991 |
| Date | 2007-06-29 | 1991-02-20 |
| Category | technology | technology |
| What happened | The first iPhone went on sale after a January announcement. | Guido van Rossum released version 0.9.0 publicly. |

## 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.

## Python

Python was started as a hobby project over Christmas 1989 and first released publicly in February 1991 — four years before Java, JavaScript, PHP and Ruby, all of which arrived in 1995. Most people assume it is much newer because its popularity arrived twenty years after it did. It is named after Monty Python, not the snake.

## Common questions

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

Python, by 16 years — 1991 against 2007.

### When did the iPhone start?

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

### When did Python start?

1991. Guido van Rossum released version 0.9.0 publicly.

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## Sources

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