The first Apple computer sold as a bare circuit board was the Apple I.
Designed largely by Steve Wozniak, the Apple I was Apple Computer Company’s first product and went on sale in 1976. It was an unusual early personal computer because its circuit board included video-terminal circuitry, letting owners connect a keyboard and an ordinary monitor or television rather than buy a separate expensive terminal.
The original product was marketed mainly to hobbyists as a partially completed kit. Buyers generally had to provide or build a case, keyboard, display, and sometimes other supporting hardware. That is why descriptions often call it a “motherboard-only” computer, even though it was more than just an unpopulated board: key components were already installed.
A common mix-up is the Apple II, which followed it in 1977 and became the company’s much more polished mass-market success. The Apple I is also called Apple-1 or Apple Computer 1; those labels refer to the same pioneering machine. Steve Jobs and Wozniak initially promoted bare boards, but the Byte Shop’s Paul Terrell ordered assembled units, helping establish the Apple I as a complete working computer.