Reports of iPhone 8 units with swollen batteries are increasing, causing some to believe that this may be a more widespread problem than once thought. It's not clear whether the problem is occurring only in freak cases or in larger batches of phones, but this might be a potential PR disaster for Apple.

Swelling iPhone 8 Batteries Part Of A Bigger Problem?

Reports about iPhone 8 units splitting apart either on arrival or after a few days' worth of use have been coming out over the past week, allegedly because of a problem with its battery. What's apparently happening is that the phone's battery is swelling, which causes the housing to bend forward and detach from the frame of the device.

Unlike with the Samsung Galaxy Note 7, there haven't been any reports of an iPhone 8 exploding, thankfully. The first report came from Taiwan, followed by Japan, then China, Canada, and, most recently, Greece. So far, there have only been six reports, which is a pretty small number, but there's a chance it could be a precursor to a more widespread problem, like Apple's antennagate fiasco.

Apple has issued a short statement on the matter, saying it's "aware" of the issue and is "looking into it."

Apple hasn't shared exactly how many iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus units it has managed to sell thus far, but The Verge speculates that Apple has sold millions by now and argues that in a production run on that scale, there's bound to be some defective units — one or two bad apples in a case of good apples, so to speak. But if there are two or more bad apples in every case, that's a problem.

It remains uncertain, really, whether the six reported cases are representative of a potentially Note 7-level company fiasco. If this is indeed a legitimate hardware or design defect on Apple's part, then more reports are bound to come out over time.

Apple iPhone 8 And iPhone 8 Plus

The Apple iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus went on sale Sept. 22. They're iterative upgrades to last year's iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, featuring minimal but important upgrades. For starters, they're now packed with Apple's new A11 Bionic chip, believed to be custom designed for Apple's forthcoming augmented reality projects.

Not much has changed with the cameras, but the bigger iPhone 8 Plus now supports a so-called Portrait Mode, which turns an otherwise normal portrait and applies different filters to imitate certain lighting conditions, like that of a studio, stage lights, and others.

There's also the iPhone X, featuring a riskier design than the other two flagship entries. It's Apple first-ever $1,000 phone, shipping Nov. 3.