I saw the recent headlines of “Apple is slashing iPhone orders because no one buys iPhones anymore!” headlines flood my feeds this week and I thought to myself, “haven’t we been here before?”

January 2016:  Apple shares fall after reports of cuts to iPhone 6S and 6S Plus production 

iPhone production may be slowing down: Apple is expected to cut production of its latest models by about 30% in the January-March quarter due to mounting unsold units, it has been reported. The news disturbed investors in the US tech giant, sending share price sharply lower to close to $100, a level unseen since 2014.

Q1 2016 had record iPhone unit sales .

December 2016: Chipmakers Tumble Most Since June on Report Apple Cut Orders | Data Center Knowledge

Chipmakers dropped the most in five months after a report that Apple Inc. is reducing orders for iPhone 7 parts reignited a post U.S.-election selloff in technology stocks.

Q1 2017 turned out to be the highest unit sales quarter the company ever had (78.3M units).

December 2017: Apple supposedly cut iPhone X production in response to lower demand 

The report quotes notes from analysts who have already lowered iPhone X shipment projections for the first quarter of 2018, citing a lackluster demand at the end of the holiday shopping season.

The iPhone X was the best selling iPhone every week for 6 months after launch.

November 2018:  Apple cuts production orders for all three new iPhone models: WSJ 

A lower-than-expected demand for the new iPhones and Apple's decision to offer more models has made it difficult to anticipate the number of components and handsets the company needs, according to the WSJ report here.

iPhone unit sales were slightly up again in Q4 2018, but we’ll have to wait and see how Q1 2019 goes when they announce those numbers in February.

Maybe this will indeed be the year that the new iPhones sell poorly and Apple needs to take a long look at what it’s doing, but this is why people who follow Apple roll their eyes a little when we hear about the company cutting iPhone orders; it’s a story every year since the iPhone 6s came out.