These early days of AI improvement are full of guarantees, potential, pleasure, hallucinations, and abominations. These early days are additionally costing us some huge cash, too. Take RAM, for instance. Costs have skyrocketed as a result of demand has skyrocketed, because of AI infrastructure wants. Up to now, the Apple client hasn’t been affected, however that would change quickly.
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo not too long ago posted an evaluation of the RAM market and the way Apple may deal with the state of affairs surrounding its most necessary product, the iPhone. The TLDR model: Kuo thinks Apple will do what it might to “at the very least hold the beginning worth flat” for the iPhone 18 launch this fall. In keeping with Kuo, Apple could also be prepared to take successful to its margins within the brief time period to tempt patrons as Android producers enhance their costs. The misplaced income could possibly be made up via its Providers division, he urged.
Apple’s Providers have been posting file quarters for a while now, and its margins are most likely fairly favorable for Apple (and largely unaffected by rising part prices). So Kuo’s concept is sensible, however–stepping outdoors of Kuo’s evaluation now–can Providers income actually develop sufficient to offset the elevated price? It’s arduous to inform what’s going to occur, not simply with the RAM market, which Kuo expects to proceed all through 2026, however with something within the provide chain. (Kuo reviews that “different elements may additionally run brief because the AI server increase continues to squeeze the remainder of the availability chain.” And I’m not even contemplating any attainable tariffs.)
Even with out understanding Apple’s technique, budgets, and inside numbers, it looks like {hardware} worth will increase should occur sooner or later, and the Mac looks like a product the place Apple may increase costs. If Apple is adamant about protecting iPhone costs flat, Macs are a sufficiently big market to assist keep Apple’s total profitability, however sufficiently small in order that any destructive response or a lower in gross sales may be absorbed within the brief run. Plus, it’s the one product the place RAM is bought individually, so Apple has some flexibility with pricing.
Throughout Apple’s first quarter 2026 monetary outcomes name, Apple CEO Tim Cook dinner was requested concerning the impact of the RAM state of affairs on Apple. “We’re at present constrained, and at this level it’s tough to foretell when provide and demand will steadiness,” he stated. “Presently we’re seeing much less flexibility within the provide chain than regular, partly due to our elevated demand.”
Cook dinner additionally famous that whereas “reminiscence had a minimal impression” on the primary quarter that simply completed, he does anticipate “it to be “a bit extra of an impression” going ahead, with wholesale pricing for reminiscence “rising considerably.” Cook dinner didn’t remark particularly on how RAM and different provide chain points will have an effect on pricing, solely to say Apple will “have a look at a variety of choices to cope with that.”
Later this 12 months, Apple reportedly shall be releasing a revamped MacBook Professional with M6 chips, OLED touchscreen shows, and a thinner design. Greater costs for these laptops received’t fly underneath the radar, however they will surely be camouflaged by the dramatic product modifications. With the availability change points now affecting manufacturing, it looks like ideally suited timing for a Mac worth enhance within the second half of this 12 months.
So in the event you’re planning on shopping for a Mac later this 12 months, be ready. Or purchase one now. And if nothing occurs, properly, then, take that money you saved and purchase your self some new AirTags.
