Sprint today boasted that the Samsung Instinct is its fastest-selling device ever for the company's 3G network. The company notes that the touchscreen device is "breaking records" for first-week sales and touts that Samsung has had to step up production of the phone to meet a surge in demand; there are ongoing but allegedly temporary shortages of the Instinct at various locations in the US, according to Sprint.

The carrier also points to most users making heavy use of the data features, particularly e-mail, web, and map data for the built-in GPS feature. The shift is largely credited to the Instinct's better network support as the first Sprint phone to use EVDO Revision A, which typically pushes downstream speeds up to 1.4Mbps.

Sprint however has declined to publish definite numbers for the sales, making it difficult to compare the launch to that of the iPhone that the carrier is targeting with the Instinct. Apple is commonly though to have sold about 270,000 iPhones on its opening weekend despite the higher initial price, while Sprint in turn waited until after the pricing of the iPhone 3G to set a $129 price point, or $70 less than what Apple lists for its own device.