Apple confirms iPad, Macbook price hikes: How AI boom led to soaring prices
Apple has jacked up prices of iPads and MacBooks on Thursday, citing an increase in memory and storage chip costs due to AI expansion.
The move does not affect Apple's highest-selling product and primary revenue driver, the iPhone.
One of the world's most valuable companies has been affected by the memory price surge that has dulled the outlook for smartphones and PC sales.
Apple announces price hikes
"We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly," Apple said in a statement, announcing the higher prices for Macs and iPads as AI-driven demand for memory chips continues to push up costs.
They added, "We have shielded our customers from these increases so far, but we have now reached a point where we need to begin raising prices on a number of products, including today’s increases for iPad and Mac."
"The rapid expansion of AI data centres has created an extraordinary surge in demand for memory and storage. We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly," Apple said in the written statement.
New prices of Apple products amid AI boom
The price hike would take the starting price of the Neo, its lowest-priced laptop, from $599 to $600, just months after launch.
Prices of a MacBook Air with 512 gigabytes went up $200. A MacBook Pro with 1 terabyte of storage will become $300 more expensive.
Apple also raised prices for both versions of its HomePod smart speaker and Apple TV set-top box.
Shares of the company fell nearly 5 per cent, while Dell was down more than 8 per cent, as Apple's tight supplier ties have provided some shield, allowing them to increase prices on a lower rate compare to its rival.
Memory makers such as Micron have prioritised orders from AI chipmakers such as Nvidia. The move has helped the memory makers to record profits but has left little supply for electronics makers, prompting it to increase prices.
Will the iPhone price see an increase?
According to analysts, the iPhone would not be spared from the price hike for much longer, as Nabila Popal, a senior research director at IDC, said, "The iPhone isn't spared. Its hike is coming."
"It was incredbly strategic for Apple to make the price hike announcements prior to the iPhone fall launch so the headlines at launch is not the price hikes but the value the new phones bring."
Prices of dynamic random access memory, used in virtually all modern tech gadgets, rose as much as 98 per cent in the first quarter of 2026 and are set to jump by another 58 per cent to 63 per cent in the current quarter.
The surge, dubbed by some experts as "Ram-ageddon", has been driven by a boom in the construction of data centres for AI training.
Micron said on Wednesday it has locked in $22 billion in such long-term commitments from customers looking to secure their memory supplies.
Microsoft increases prices of Xbox consoles
On the other hand, Microsoft said on Thursday, June 25, it would raise the prices of its Xbox video game consoles worldwide by between $100 and $150 from August 1, also blaming soaring chip prices driven by AI-related demand.
In the US, the cheapest Xbox, the Series S, will increase to $500, while the Series X will cost around $800 from its $600 price tag.
Consumer electronics manufacturers have all been affected by rising component costs. In recent months, Sony and Nintendo have also raised the prices of their game consoles.
The rising costs are expected to affect devics sales this year, with IDC estimating that the smartphone market would see its biggest-ever annual decline of nearly 14% this year, while the PC market would fall 11.3%.
