Apple iPhone 18 Pro said to keep price in check with aggressive cost-cutting measures

Apple recently officially confirmed that the company will have to raise prices for iPhones, iPads, and Macs. Shortly thereafter, analysts at TechInsights calculated that Apple could raise the price of the most affordable iPhone 18 Pro to as much as $1,399, while the iPhone 17 Pro ($934 on Amazon) is still available in the Apple Store starting at $1,099. Analysts at J.P. Morgan reached a different conclusion in an analysis of production costs.

According to their analysis, while Apple’s costs for DRAM and flash memory in iPhone production are set to rise from $65 to $228 between 2025 and 2027, Apple is expected to counteract this by cutting costs on other components. As a result, the production cost of the iPhone 18 Pro, excluding RAM and flash memory, is expected to drop from $449 to $426; for the iPhone 19 Pro, analysts anticipate a further reduction to $384. To make these savings possible, Apple is expected to rely on an in-house 5G modem, among other measures, instead of a Qualcomm modem.

The iPhone 17e and iPhone Air already use an Apple modem, but the iPhone 17 Pro (Max) does not. J.P. Morgan estimates that, as a result of these cost-cutting measures, production costs will rise by only $26 in total this year and by an additional $56 next year. To maintain its current profit margins, Apple would therefore need to raise the price of the base model by "only" $50 to $100.