Apple sells over 4m iPhone 4S in opening weekend

Apple has announced launch weekend sales figures for the new iPhone 4S, confirming that over 4m of the iOS 5 smartphones have been sold since it went on sale last Friday. Meanwhile, over 25m people are now using iOS 5 having upgraded their iPad, iPod touch or existing iPhone since the platform's release last wednesday.

"iPhone 4S is off to a great start with more than four million sold in its first weekend – the most ever for a phone and more than double the iPhone 4 launch during its first three days" Apple SVP of Worldwide Product Marketing Philip Schiller said in a statement today. "iPhone 4S is a hit with customers around the world, and together with iOS 5 and iCloud, is the best iPhone ever."

As for iCloud, Apple's cloud-sync backup service, the company says more than 20m users have already signed up for access. iCloud offers a remote way to safely store the data from your smartphone, as well as allowing for music access across iOS devices.

The next batch of countries to get iPhone 4S will be Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. The smartphone will go on sale there come October 28.