Apple anticipates price increases

Published: 2026-05-04 01:01:19 ET AAPL

Published on 05/04/2026 at 01:01 am EDT

Apple expects memory costs (RAM and storage chips) to rise significantly in the near future, making products such as iPhones and MacBooks more expensive.

According to CEO Tim Cook, these higher costs will become particularly visible in the coming quarter and beyond. So far, Apple has been able to absorb some of the increase through smart inventory management, but that will not be possible indefinitely.

The rising prices are due to a global shortage of, and strong demand for, memory chips, driven in part by AI applications and data centres.

Jacob Bourne, senior tech analyst at Emarketer, believes Apple can still withstand the global scarcity of memory chips and points to the resilience of the tech company’s supply chain.

Cook expects the shortage to have the greatest impact on the Mac Mini, Mac Studio and MacBook Neo.

Apple deliberately does not make its own memory chips (such as RAM and NAND storage) because of cost and specialisation. Companies such as Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix and Micron Technology are fully specialised in memory production. They invest tens of billions in factories that produce nothing but RAM and storage.

Apple, by contrast, mainly designs logic chips (SoCs) such as the A and M series. That is a different ball game from memory.