This is the year of smartphone price hikes
Following Apple's latest iPhone launch, nearly every major smartphone maker has raised prices by around $100 this year, driven by ongoing component shortages.
Apple's newly unveiled iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max start at $1,199 and $1,299 — a $100 increase over their predecessors. Older iPhone models got the same $100 price bump, so there's no way to dodge the higher cost by buying an older model.
Apple isn't alone. Raising prices by roughly $100 has become an industry-wide pattern this year. Google and Samsung both followed the same approach with their latest launches. The Pixel 11 starts at $899, up from $799 for last year's Pixel 10, while the Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra launched at $2,099 — $100 more than the Galaxy Z Fold 7 it replaced.
The trend extends beyond the three biggest phone makers. Sony's new Xperia 10 VIII costs £150 more than its predecessor in the UK, and this year's Moto Razr phones are also $100 pricier than before, despite offering little meaningful upgrade. Sales data suggests phones priced under $100 could disappear from the market entirely before long.
What's driving the increases
The price hikes trace back to ongoing component shortages caused by the buildout of AI data centers, a squeeze that could persist for years with no signs of easing. Memory chips have seen some of the steepest increases. Nothing CEO Carl Pei said earlier this year that RAM costs for the Nothing Phone 4A had doubled by the time the device launched. Prices are climbing across nearly every component used in phones and other tech devices — Qualcomm, which supplies processors for many handsets, raised its chip prices earlier this month.
Apple was later than its rivals to raise prices, much as it was late to release a foldable phone, which could suggest both trends are here to stay.
