iPhone 15 Pro models could cost at least $100 more

AppleInsider

Yet more rumors claim the iPhone 15 Pro will become more expensive than the iPhone 14 Pro line, with a potential price hike of up to $200 expected.

iPhone 15 Pro Max render

The Pro models of iPhone are on the premium end of the scale within the generation, but for 2023, they could be more costly to consumers. The price rise rumors are also prompting concern from industry observers, warning of a possible decline in shipments.

The report published Tuesday by DigiTimes forecasts the price of the iPhone 15 Pro at $1,099 at a minimum, a cost that's $100 more than its iPhone 14 Pro counterpart. Likewise, the iPhone 15 Pro Max may end up costing $1,299, $100 more than the iPhone 14 Pro Max at $1,199.

This is all based on a $100 price rise, but a $200 increase is also a possibility.

There have been numerous murmurs of a price rise for the Pro lineup for a while, with mentions of a $100 or $200 price rise surfacing earlier in 2023.

A price rise could have a negative impact on the sales of the premium models, with the report estimating shipments of new Pro models in 2023 reducing down from an initial forecast of 83 million units to 77 million units.

For Apple, fewer sales of premium models may not necessarily be a bad thing, especially if it can earn more profit per device. However, it's a difficult path to take, as it doesn't want to increase the price so much that it erodes sales and earns less overall.

Read on AppleInsider

TheObannonFile

Lame. They already cost enough. Profit margins are very high. And cost to build goes down the entire life cycle of the device.

I’m all about business and profit, but this seems unnecessary.

xyzzy01

They're already increasing a lot outside the US due to the strong dollar, this might make it even worse.

charlesn

TheObannonFile said:

Lame. They already cost enough. Profit margins are very high. And cost to build goes down the entire life cycle of the device.

I’m all about business and profit, but this seems unnecessary.

The base price of the iPhone X in 2016 was $999. The base price of the iPhone 14 Pro in 2023 is $999 and it's an exponentially better phone in every measurable parameter. You may have noticed that the six years between these phones included the worst period of global price inflation that has been seen in half a century. It is still not over. But Apple never raised prices. It just kept delivering a better phone every year for the same money. (Actually, in real dollars, LESS money, since inflation erodes the value of a dollar over time. We've been paying the same price with dollars are are worth less in buying power.) And, according to you and the school of All About Business and Profit, I guess they are never allowed to raise prices. And if that's not correct, then what are the conditions under which you'd think a price increase would be warranted?

Would I prefer no price increase on the Pro line-up? Of course. But knowing that Apple has absorbed all the inflationary price increases over the past several years, I understand that prices can't stay the same forever. 

mikethemartian

I just assume they will charge whatever the market will bear.

omasou

Increase in base price w/o an increase in base RAM will be a hard sell.

jamnap

Sure, price increases affect all of us, but when was the last time you paid for a iOS/MacOs/WatchOS/TVos software update?  It costs $$$$ for engineers to R&D great hardware and for software engineers to contantly tweak and update billions of lines of code with new/improved features. These services have to be factored in to purchase prices.  I own just about every category of Apple products and subscribe to many of their services, and I have never had any hardware failures, and services remain reliable (with an occasional outage now and then).  Most of my friends on the Windows platform often get hit for software update: I have never paid for a osMac update.  So when you hear of Apple’s quarterly profits, think about how much goes to R&D.  Pricing for everything is going up, but I won’t mind a higher 15 Pro Max knowing I am purchasing a top-of-the-line high-tech and dependable device. You get what you pay for. Ciao.

CheeseFreeze

jamnap said:

Sure, price increases affect all of us, but when was the last time you paid for a iOS/MacOs/WatchOS/TVos software update?  It costs $$$$ for engineers to R&D great hardware and for software engineers to contantly tweak and update billions of lines of code with new/improved features. These services have to be factored in to purchase prices.  I own just about every category of Apple products and subscribe to many of their services, and I have never had any hardware failures, and services remain reliable (with an occasional outage now and then).  Most of my friends on the Windows platform often get hit for software update: I have never paid for a osMac update.  So when you hear of Apple’s quarterly profits, think about how much goes to R&D.  Pricing for everything is going up, but I won’t mind a higher 15 Pro Max knowing I am purchasing a top-of-the-line high-tech and dependable device. You get what you pay for. Ciao.

Selling OS licenses is not their business model. It’s services. It’s completely different for Microsoft who doesn’t sell the PC and locks customers out of using something else.

You position Apple as a poor victim and they are some sort of a non-profit. They are worth trillions and have billions of cash at hand. Stop defending them. This is Tim Cook who wants to maintain a gigantic markup on these devices and earn hundreds of millions on stock more this year.  

entropys

Janmap, you have paid for the OS updates in the hardware already. That provision would not have changed in any meaningful way, and in any case would not be reflected in a jump in hardware price of $100. This is about margins.
apologists for this kind of margin escalation are incredible.
Tim Apple: “let’s see if we can up our already industry leading margins, and not in a small way, how about we increase RRP 10 percent more this year to really give margins a kick along?”
Apple defender, while assuming the Kevin Bacon position: “Thank You Sir!  May I have another?”

multimedia

I expect to spend more thank $2K for my 2TB 15 Ultra.

waveparticle

CheeseFreeze said:

jamnap said:

Sure, price increases affect all of us, but when was the last time you paid for a iOS/MacOs/WatchOS/TVos software update?  It costs $$$$ for engineers to R&D great hardware and for software engineers to contantly tweak and update billions of lines of code with new/improved features. These services have to be factored in to purchase prices.  I own just about every category of Apple products and subscribe to many of their services, and I have never had any hardware failures, and services remain reliable (with an occasional outage now and then).  Most of my friends on the Windows platform often get hit for software update: I have never paid for a osMac update.  So when you hear of Apple’s quarterly profits, think about how much goes to R&D.  Pricing for everything is going up, but I won’t mind a higher 15 Pro Max knowing I am purchasing a top-of-the-line high-tech and dependable device. You get what you pay for. Ciao.

Selling OS licenses is not their business model. It’s services. It’s completely different for Microsoft who doesn’t sell the PC and locks customers out of using something else.

You position Apple as a poor victim and they are some sort of a non-profit. They are worth trillions and have billions of cash at hand. Stop defending them. This is Tim Cook who wants to maintain a gigantic markup on these devices and earn hundreds of millions on stock more this year.  

Apple is not a monopoly. Even in its most profitable iPhone division. I am only mad if the OS is not stable.

thrang

Meh, people including me will buy, and I'm sure there will be enough upgrades to make it more than palpable. 

Buy the one you can afford, not sure why there is all this blathering. Everything costs more, this is how you know Bidenomics is working...

mac_dog

TheObannonFile said:

Lame. They already cost enough. Profit margins are very high. And cost to build goes down the entire life cycle of the device.

I’m all about business and profit, but this seems unnecessary.

It never ceases to amaze me when business people complain about the cost of anything. It’s called free market capitalism. And the phone will be a huge success. 

mattinoz

charlesn said:

TheObannonFile said:

Lame. They already cost enough. Profit margins are very high. And cost to build goes down the entire life cycle of the device.

I’m all about business and profit, but this seems unnecessary.

The base price of the iPhone X in 2016 was $999. The base price of the iPhone 14 Pro in 2023 is $999 and it's an exponentially better phone in every measurable parameter. You may have noticed that the six years between these phones included the worst period of global price inflation that has been seen in half a century. It is still not over. But Apple never raised prices. It just kept delivering a better phone every year for the same money. (Actually, in real dollars, LESS money, since inflation erodes the value of a dollar over time. We've been paying the same price with dollars are are worth less in buying power.) And, according to you and the school of All About Business and Profit, I guess they are never allowed to raise prices. And if that's not correct, then what are the conditions under which you'd think a price increase would be warranted?

Would I prefer no price increase on the Pro line-up? Of course. But knowing that Apple has absorbed all the inflationary price increases over the past several years, I understand that prices can't stay the same forever. 

Given Wages have stagnated during that period of inflation  (well since the '70's) then the relative value of that price point has gone up as spending power has gone down. So Apple has a problem increasing prices in USA and the recovering US dollars shrinks the market even more aggressively in the rest of the world than keeping the price. 

Sure Apple get to play the game how they want to. If they do push the pro price up I could see them pushing the regular iPhone price down by the same amount to make sure they can hold the lower prices relatively stable worldwide. They can make the Pro a bigger gap in terms of price and features to help the pricing make sense. 

To me the problem Apple has is not competition but people realising the real longevity of the device they own. 

tyler82

Really happy with my 14 Pro Max. Think I’ll hang onto it for several more years, at least. 

chasm

Have any of you — the ones who made some thoughtful, intelligent points, and then there’s the obligatory “duuurrrr Bidenomics” guy … considered the possibility that Apple is raising the price because there are hardware and software features in the next iPhone that people would gladly pay $100 more for, such as significantly better camera system and optical zoom? Or the vast array of already-obvious new features?

There are also myriad other explanations for such a modest price rise that don’t involve malevolence, you know.

entropys

Yeah but there is a lot of fun to be had in grizzling.  

iDunn0!

Is it possible the entry level Pros will have 256GB, up from 128GB? That would explain some of the price increase.

How about the rumour of a 2TB option on Pros?

longfang

TheObannonFile said:

Lame. They already cost enough. Profit margins are very high. And cost to build goes down the entire life cycle of the device.

I’m all about business and profit, but this seems unnecessary.

Your sense of entitlement is showing. 

kellie

It’s easy to absorb inflationary supply costs when Apple Pay’s third world labor rates for assembly.

dewme

TheObannonFile said:

Lame. They already cost enough. Profit margins are very high. And cost to build goes down the entire life cycle of the device.

I’m all about business and profit, but this seems unnecessary.

Every new product has its own lifecycle. If Apple was building the same exact product every year then they would benefit from process efficiencies and economies of scale. But non recurring engineering, production tooling and line startup costs, supplier price increases, material price increases, wage increases, transportation costs, etc., just keep going up and up.

The smartphone business has always been a bit insane with its very short lifecycles and rapid rate of change. Things have probably gotten better because people aren’t upgrading as frequently as they did in the past, but Apple, Samsung, and other smartphone makers are not going to slow down their rate of change anytime soon. A lot of this is driven by consumer expectations. Imagine if Apple tried to sell nothing but the same two or three products for years on end, like Tesla does. 

Finally, can you name any consumer product or service that has not seen significant price increases in the last year? I’m paying at least 25%-30% more for food/groceries over a year ago. Apple’s suppliers and employees eat too, so they’re seeing the same thing. Should we be telling them to “suck it up” and forget about raises this year so we can pay the same price for our extravagances this year as we did last year? We can all be running SE models if that’s what it takes to hold the line on out-of-pocket expenses. Don’t forget, the phones being talked about here are at the top tier of what anyone can purchase. If you’re pinching pennies, why are you worried about the cost of an iPhone 15 Pro Max?