Apple just announced unprecedented price increases for the majority of the product line, only the iPhone and Apple Watch do not see a price increase. This is because of the AI-driven memory crunch caused by AI data centers buying too many memory supplies and putting tons of pressure on the market.
Apple tried to stop for a while, but the situation out of hand. It should be noted that these storage pressures have been present all year and are only now reaching the point where they are unsustainable. However, we’ll explore why and when you should expect things to improve.
Memory supply pressures
As noted by Apple CEO Tim Cook in the interview with The Wall Street JournalApple simply couldn’t maintain its current prices with sudden increases:
“Unfortunately, price increases are inevitable,” he said. “We are doing everything we can to reduce the huge increases that have been passed on to us and we are trying to protect our customers from the increases, but the situation has become unsustainable.”
As mentioned earlier, this was only caused by the construction of huge AI data centers, which put a lot of pressure on the memory supply. For example, 32GB of DDR5 memory has basically quadrupled in price over the past year, with a 6000MHz kit that used to be under $90 now selling for around $400.
This is just to give you an idea of consumer prices – it’s not necessarily an apples-to-apples comparison. Apple uses a higher level of memory and also has an added cost due to the complexity of soldering it into the chipset die rather than as a separate component.
Will it get better?
At some point, yes, it will improve – but it’s hard to say how long it will take.
Micron, a leading memory supplier began to sew There are several new memory fabs in the US that are expected to come online in the next few years – with the last one expected to be operational by 2030. They are just one supplier, but any additional supplies would greatly help.
Apple, on the other hand, started new lobbying efforts To force the US government to allow them to do business with several Chinese memory suppliers that are currently blacklisted. Apple isn’t technically banned from buying this storage, but it would be a big problem with government officials using Apple devices. If Apple had an extra memory supply that wasn’t heavily demanded by AI hyperscalers, that might make a difference in the near future.
Otherwise, the only hope is that the AI build slows down. Right now, the situation will continue to get worse before it gets better. In the third and fourth quarters of 2026, an increase of more than a quarter It is expected to be 30-50%. There is Apple already indicated there may be more price increases in the future, although they only refer to products without price increases.
Overall, I’d say wait about 2-4 years unless Apple succeeds in its efforts to use Chinese storage. It’s still going to be rough, but if that happens, maybe we’ll see some reduction.
What can you do?
All I can say at this point is that if you want something new, it’s probably best to buy it now, and I’d also recommend warning people around you. Of course, if your device is working well, don’t rush to upgrade just because of a mid-term price increase.
Meanwhile, Amazon is still selling existing inventory of Macs and iPads at lower prices. Those prices aren’t as low as they were on Prime Day, but they’re still well below the new prices after the official increases. I will list some deals below.
Mac:
- MacBook Air 13 inch (M5, 1TB SSD, 16GB RAM) – $1,149 at Amazon (vs. $1,599 at Apple)
- MacBook Air 15 inch (M5, 512 GB SSD, 16 GB RAM) – $1,249 at Amazon (vs. $1,499 at Apple)
- MacBook Pro 14 inch (M5, 1TB SSD, 16GB RAM) – $1,649 at Amazon (vs. $1,999 at Apple)
- MacBook Pro 14 inch (M5 Pro, 1TB SSD, 24GB RAM) – $2,149 at Amazon (vs. $2,499 at Apple)
- MacBook Pro 16 inch (M5 Pro, 1TB SSD, 24GB RAM) – $2,649 at Amazon (vs. $2,999 at Apple)
- The MacBook Neo and Mac mini are currently unavailable from Amazon at the time of writing.
iPad:
It’s a real bummer to look at all these higher prices, especially considering that Apple has become one of the best value options on the market over the past year. Of course, these price increases don’t happen in a vacuum, and the rest of the industry will also be dealing with a memory crunch.
My favorite Apple accessory recommendations:
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