alt Hacker NewsApple increases MacBook and iPad prices by 20%
Comments
This feels like the car market during COVID.
In December Best Buy had a $1999 configuration of the M5 MacBook Pro on sale for $1749 and I scooped one up. Now that model is $2199. I suspect I could sell the computer I've been using for 6 months at a profit, which is just bizarre. But then of course it would cost a lot if I wanted to replace it.
Oh the bright side they do offer $AAPL with a 5% discount today.
If you're in the US, Costco has certain models at the old price through Saturday (or while supplies last). Just pulled the trigger on a 24GB/1TB 13" MbA for $250 off the new price.
I was literally ordering an M5 MacBook Pro tomorrow. The total is $900 more now. Might have to hold off and just live with my M4 Mini.
So this is probably not good news for the MacBook Ultra with 512GB of RAM rumors being..affordable.
What's worse is that this is probably going to get worse. My angel investment group is getting inundated with pitches that amount to building an RX-6000 with 96GB of RAM and installing a local model to do "thing X".
So even if the OpenAI's of the world stop trying to use up all the RAM, you're going to have thousands of start-ups pushing local models.
I thought Apple usually locked in contracts with TSMC and Samsung for years in the future? They should be best positioned to weather this storm. If they are getting buffeted enough to raise prices by this much, things are going to be dire for smaller manufacturers.
Or, this could just be a convenient excuse to get even more margin.
WOW. I'm glad I bought the beast yesterday.
The same spec machine I got yesterday is now $2800 more.
Personal computing is in shambles right now. It has been for a bit. It was hard to buy video cards for a while, now other components are affected too.
Bring back upgradeable RAM and storage.
My prediction is that the semiconductor price increases is going to cause a lot of demand destruction. The semiconductor companies revenues is not based on new products but rather on the fact that there is scarcity. Once that scarcity is removed then I suspect that we're going to have some reckoning happening across the industry.
Just bought a MacBook Air that I didn't need to hedge in case my current laptop breaks down. Won't be buying it at the higher price.
They simply couldn't cut into their fat margins, could they?
Catering to the top of the k-shaped economy is indistinguishable from evil
Glad I bought a fully loaded MBP a few weeks back and not now. The price on my exact configuration just went up a whopping 29%!
I wonder if they will give more for trade-ins now or keep the old rate and just resell it at these higher prices.
If you wanted to buy in the near term, Amazon is offering Prime Day discounts off of the old prices today.
> M5 MacBook Air - $949.00 (now $1,299.00 at Apple)
M5 MacBook Pro - $1,549.00 (now $1,999.00 at Apple)
https://www.macrumors.com/2026/06/25/beat-apples-price-hike/
The M5 Max 128GB RAM MBP I was eyeing went up by $1600. Thankfully Amazon and some other retailers haven’t updated their prices yet, so I immediately picked one up this morning.
I've been dragging my feet on upgrading my M1 Air, guess now I'm just going to wait a bit longer. Truth be told, it's still sufficient for web dev but I figured at ~5 years old I should upgrade it..
Wild that they increased the ipad prices as well; the entire point of the ipad is that it's a handicapped tool to avoid cutting into macbook marketshare.
FYI - other retailers still have the old prices. Some even have discounts. The cheapest MacBook Air is now $1300 on Apple and $950 on Amazon and Best Buy. I imagine this will change soon, so grab them while you can.
I bought an M4 Air about a year ago for under 1000$, it beat out my 2019 Intel MBP by quite a lot.
I fully expect the air to last me at least another 6 years or so for my use case. The thing is a beast.
Compare this to a Dell laptop I bought when I started college, that thing was 850 dollars and died on me within 3 years. For Apple, I could justify spending more (maybe even 20% more) considering both Apple computers I’ve had feel extremely fast. The only reason I dropped the 2019 MBP was battery fatigue (and I probably could have repaired it for 100$ and gotten another 3-4 years out of it. But the new air was just too attractive).
With all the inflation going on and the AI boom affecting things like memory prices, I was surprised that eg. MacBook neo was priced where it was.
Does somebody have a price increase by currency table? A lot of losers vs. USD since apple last set their prices.
Man, if there was anyone that could weather the storm with their thick memory margins (at least on upgrades), it should have been Apple.
The increase to the old Apple TV or Homepod is egregious.
So this is how Apple makes up for the margins on the Neos.
Mac Studio M3 Ultra: $5299 (+$1300)
Oof. That and October delivery. I wonder if the intent here is basically just to signal to the market where the M5 Ultra Studio is going to start.
As an app developer, having to eat an ever increasing Mac hardware cost upfront may push people like me to just focus on Android.
Still no 256GB or 512GB Studio models at any price. 96 is the max for any Studio configuration on apple.com right now.
Different article, but accessible to non-subscribers: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3ryj81ywlro
Nano texture display option also got a price increase. Thankfully, AppleCare+ didn't.
Forgive me because I do not understand the supply chain for memory. With Micron et al effectively scalping their customers with an oligopoly on probably the lowest intellectual IP in the chain, does this not guarantee 10 years from now a) We are either overbuilt as hyperscalers cut capex, or b) hyperscalers vertically integrate. Or is it truly that hard to make memory? And if that is not true, perhaps it isn't really a commodity at all.
Honestly Jassey, Zuck and Tim Apple are prob on the phone with Donnie. If oil companies are “gouging,” what is 85% margins on memory, threatening the whole bull run and raising compute, Killing AI, and raising iPhone/computer pricing? Countdown to DOJ antitrust case is ticking.
To be clear: I understand how markets work, Im just quoting Donald Trump's tweet from yesterday calling oil companies gouging, and I predict government intervention and polital pressures regardless of economic realities.
Expect this trend to continue -- firms have delayed price adjustments to avoid retaliation from Trump as doing so would draw attention to Trump's many inflationary policies.
Now all of the businesses who use Apple products as an input are more likely to raise their own prices, etc. This is how inflation happens across the economy. Trade war leads to price increases on Apple's inputs, Apple has to raise prices, etc.
My pre-built desktop PC is as cheap today as last year at the same store...
Dont get the panic. :)
"Apple has increased the price of MacBooks and iPads by about 20 per cent worldwide, one of the broadest price rises in its history, as the iPhone maker blamed memory chip shortages caused by the AI infrastructure boom."
Some unc perspective: I paid ~$6,000 in inflation-adjusted dollars for a computer in 1996. Today, I can get the same power in a $6 single board computer. A powerful modern mini PC starts at ~$600.
However painful these price hikes are, and they are painful, it is worth remembering that computing has become incredibly ubiquitous and cheap.