Apple's recently released gold variant of the iPhone 5s was apparently jokingly called the "Kardashian  phone" by its employees during development.

The news comes courtesy of New York Times' Nick Bilton, who took to his Twitter account on Friday, October 18 to reveal the same.

"A source at Apple told me while they were making the gold iPhone it was referred to internally as 'The Kardashian Phone'," tweeted Bilton.

The information was also confirmed by publication TechCrunch's sources.

"We confirmed the nickname with our sources. Yes, we asked this question of our sources. Apparently this was not a serious 'code name' or anything, just an internal joke," wrote TechCrunch's Matthew Panzarino.

The champagne-color of the iPhone 5s has met with an overwhelming demand and the gold variant of the smartphone is difficult to come by. Reality star Kim Kardashian , however, has an old connection with the gold iPhone.

In 2012, before Apple even announced the champagne gold iPhone 5s, Kardashian   had her staid black iPhone 5 anodized in gold using anostyle. At the time, Kardashian   published a Twitter update pertaining to iPhone's makeover. The gold iPhone 5 even made an appearance on her hit TV show "Keeping up with the Kardashians."

"I love my gold iPhone 5 by https://anostyle.com  -- thanks," tweeted Kardashian   at the time.

Thanks to Kim, Anostyle got a massive boost in sales and revealed that orders for the gold version were the highest and it was easily the most popular product.

In 2013, Apple has launched the iPhone 5s in three color options but the black has been replaced by "space gray" and is joined by white. For the first time, Apple also introduced the champagne gold color which is the most sought after hue.