Apple has announced that its next special event will take place on September 9 under the tagline Surprise and Shine. The keynote begins at 10 a.m. Pacific Time, which lands at 2 a.m. Japan time on September 10. With a foldable iPhone widely rumored and a new chief executive stepping in just days earlier, this looks like a bigger stage than usual.

Streaming on apple.com and the Apple TV app

Apple replaced the header of its official events page with a single line, Surprise and shine., and confirmed a special event starting at 10 a.m. Pacific Time on September 9. Viewers can watch on apple.com or through the Apple TV app, and the page also offers a calendar file for adding the date. The venue is the Apple Park campus in Cupertino, California.

For viewers in Japan, that translates to 2 a.m. on September 10. Apple's own event archive shows that last year's fall keynote, which introduced the iPhone 17 lineup, also fell on September 9 local time. A Wednesday in early September remains the company's preferred slot for new iPhones.

The first major event under a new CEO

There is a second storyline running alongside the products. In April 2026, Apple said Tim Cook would move to the role of executive chairman of the board and that John Ternus, senior vice president of Hardware Engineering, would become chief executive officer effective September 1. September 9 arrives just 8 days after that handover, making it the first large-scale event of the Ternus era.

Ternus joined Apple in 2001 and had held his most recent role since 2021. Given a career spent leading hardware development, how prominently he appears on stage, and how the presentation is staged around him, will carry a message of its own.

The focus: a foldable iPhone and a Pro-only pair

Apple has said nothing official about the products themselves. The most anticipated item is the long-rumored foldable iPhone, which would be the company's first phone with a folding display.

Beyond that, the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are expected. Reports suggest both are iterative refinements rather than a substantial redesign, and that the standard iPhone 18 will not appear this year, slipping instead to next year. If the fall keynote ends up centered on Pro models alone, that would mark a real change in how the lineup is rolled out.

All of the above remains at the level of rumor and reporting, not confirmed by Apple. The actual contents will only be clear on the day.

Apple Watch, smart home devices, and OS release dates

On the wearable side, an Apple Watch Series 12 and a new Apple Watch Ultra are expected to appear, along with new smart home hardware.

On the software side, Apple may set release dates for the operating systems it previewed at WWDC26 in June. This year's lineup consists of iOS 27, iPadOS 27, macOS Golden Gate, watchOS 27, and visionOS 27, headlined by a new Siri AI built on Apple Intelligence. Pairing hardware announcements with software release timing has been standard practice at Apple's fall events for several years.

Summary

Apple's special event, Surprise and Shine, begins at 10 a.m. Pacific Time on September 9, or 2 a.m. Japan time on September 10. It streams on apple.com and the Apple TV app from the Apple Park campus. A foldable iPhone and the iPhone 18 Pro are widely expected, though neither has been confirmed. Add the fact that it is John Ternus's first event as chief executive, and there is plenty of reason to watch what actually gets announced.