Xiaomi 18 Ultra to get more expensive, camera flagship phones in jeopardy
The Xiaomi 17 Ultra currently costs a little over €1,400 on Amazon Germany and is therefore, hard as it may be to believe, one of the least expensive camera flagships with the word "Ultra" in its name. In the same storage configuration, the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra, which many now see as barely able to compete with the Chinese Ultra flagships, is hardly any cheaper. Vivo is expected to show before long what is possible at the high end of the smartphone market in 2026. Leaks put the European price of the vivo X300 Ultra at nearly €2,000, though that would come with 1TB of storage.
It is still unclear how much Oppo plans to charge for the Find X9 Ultra when it launches in Europe, but in general, the lineup of top-end camera flagships from China appears to be facing major challenges. That is at least what leaker Ice Universe emphasized in a lengthy post on X, although it is not known what the original source of this information is. According to Ice, steadily rising component costs, especially for memory, could soon make Ultra flagships no longer financially viable for manufacturers, specifically in the Chinese market.
Development of the next Ultra flagships at risk
There appears to be a price ceiling there of around 10,000 yuan, or about €1,250, beyond which Android flagships have traditionally struggled to compete with Apple's iPhone flagships. Android OEMs are therefore reluctant to keep raising prices indefinitely, as sales could otherwise collapse. The alternative would be to scale back development costs, especially for the cameras, or to stop developing Ultra models altogether. Indian leaker Yogesh Brar also suggested in a recent post on X that the next flagship generation from Xiaomi, Vivo, and Oppo is facing financial challenges.
Prices for Xiaomi 18 Ultra and other phones likely to rise
For now, development of the Vivo X500 Ultra, Oppo Find X10 Ultra, and Xiaomi 18 Ultra is still on track, Yogesh emphasized, while any potential decision to cancel them will likely not be made until the third quarter of 2026. Kartikey Singh also stressed that development of the Xiaomi 18 Ultra has not been canceled at this point, but price increases next year should be expected in any case. Fans of China's top-tier camera flagships will therefore probably be seeing price levels of around €2,000 more often. Whether many buyers will still be willing to pay that remains to be seen.
Source(s)
Ice Universe, Yogesh Brar, Kartikey Singh
Image: Weibo
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