A 34-year-old information technology assistant, Robert Lisbon, rushed to the Apple store at 103 Prince St. yesterday morning, worrying he might already be too late.

Instead, he was first in line outside the store’s entrance to purchase the new iPhone when it goes on sale Friday morning.

“I’ve had a lot of passers-by ask me to hold a spot in line,” Mr. Lisbon said, reclining in a blue lawn chair, a ThinkPad swathed in a Mac logo by his side. Nobody came back to claim their place, he said.

As of late afternoon yesterday, the party of one outside the SoHo store had grown by two. Despite the frenzy surrounding the iPhone’s release last year, the highly touted iPhone 3G upgrade, available at 8 a.m. Friday morning, attracted much smaller crowds at Apple stores across Manhattan. No one was waiting outside the 401 W. 14th St. outpost yesterday afternoon, while about 15 hopefuls queued up outside the flagship store at 767 Fifth Ave.

The iPhone 3G, which will sell for $199, is named after the third-generation cellular network that is faster than the network used with the original iPhone. The upgrade also includes GPS location tracking and wireless syncing with corporate networks. While owners of the first iPhone can download updated applications, they will not have access to those new features.

“I thought it’d be more exciting, but hopefully it’ll pick up,” Matthew Rosenhein, a recent Montclair High School graduate live-blogging the wait outside the Fifth Avenue store with three others, said of the low turnout. The number of reporters from local news outlets probably outnumbered the Apple aficionados, he added.

“When it was first released, it was like, ‘Oh, my God, iPhone,” a friend of Mr. Rosenhein’s, Geoffrey Kaicher, 17, said. “Now it’s like, ‘Oh, iPhone.”

But Mr. Kaicher, a longtime fan of Apple products and a self-professed techie, said he was still anticipating the release.

Along with Messrs. Rosenhein and Kaicher, at least half of those waiting were activists making use of an opportunity for press coverage. Camped outside with yoga mats, a solar-powered generator, and a copy of the Talking Heads’ “More Songs About Buildings and Food” since July 4, several members of the White House Organic Farm Project are petitioning the White House to convert all 17 acres of its front lawn to farmland.

For his part, Tyrone Ross, a 23-year-old sales associate at Staples, said his competitive spirit drove him to pay a friend $175 to serve as a placeholder. “I just want to have it so I can play with it before anyone else does,” he said.

Gregory Packer, a retired 44-year-old highway maintenance worker and the first person to purchase the iPhone at New York’s flagship store last year, said he did not plan on buying the new phone but was passing by to check out the turnout. “I already got mine, and I can get a free upgrade,” Mr. Packer, who reportedly has courted press coverage by attending two news events a week, said.

Curiosity compelled Anthony Giuliano, 72, to make the trek from Brooklyn and stand in line, he said.

Asked if he planned to stay the night, he shrugged. “It depends on how my kidneys hold out,” he said. “I might even try to sell my spot if I’m lucky enough.”