Apple’s Mac and iPad prices went up this week, by a good margin, no less, and the memory crisis behind them isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
The obvious next question is what happens to the iPhone 18 Pro, which is expected to arrive later this year. IDC has an answer, and you might not like it (via MacRumors).
So what exactly is IDC predicting for iPhone 18 Pro pricing?
The Senior Director of Data and Analytics at IDC, Nabila Popal, says Apple’s recent price increases have significantly raised IDC’s price estimate for the iPhone 18 Pro models.
Previously, the research firm estimated a $100 price increase for Pro models, along with a not-so-bad $50 increase for the base iPhone 18. However, after watching Apple raise Mac and iPad prices by up to $300 on some models, Popal revised the prediction upward.
“My personal instinct says the hike to iPhones may be even higher than what we assumed, perhaps even $200 to the Pro/Pro Max models,” she said. “I think the days of $50 price increases are over.”
How did IDC arrive at that estimate?
At $200 more, the iPhone 18 Pro would open at $1,299, and the Pro Max at $1,399.
To arrive at this estimate, IDC referred to other devices with 12GB of RAM and the hike that they received. The M4 iPad Air went up by $150, for instance, and the lower-tier M5 iPad Pro went up by $200.
Further, if you look at configurable products now, it takes you twice as long to upgrade to the next memory tier as it did before. IDC thinks Apple may follow a similar formula for the upcoming Pro iPhones.
Both pieces of evidence indicate an impending price hike for the iPhone 18 Pro later this year, and $200 seems quite plausible to me.
