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Friday, 13 November 2026dailybeirut.com
Tech & Science
Apple faces mounting pressure as LPDDR5X RAM and NAND flash memory prices climb, potentially affecting iPhone pricing in 2027—especially for the anticipated iPhone 18 and iPhone Air 2 models launching in spring 2027.
Apple is confronting intensifying cost pressures stemming from rising memory component prices, which could influence iPhone retail pricing in 2027, according to recent reports citing supply chain sources.
Data circulating among supply chain participants indicates that LPDDR5X RAM prices may reach approximately $2.00 per gigabit in the first quarter of 2027—up from about $1.50 per gigabit in the third quarter of 2026. Concurrently, NAND flash storage costs could increase from roughly $0.26 to $0.33 per gigabit.
The report attributes this upward trend to heightened demand from AI-driven data centers, which are consuming a substantial share of memory chip production capacity. That shift has contributed to elevated memory pricing across the smartphone industry in recent months.
According to the same supply chain report, Apple has reached a memory pricing agreement with Samsung for 2027—making it one of the first smartphone manufacturers to finalize such terms for the upcoming year.
The reported $2.00-per-gigabit figure does not translate directly to $2.00 per gigabyte of memory in a device. Memory contracts in this context use gigabits as the unit of measurement, whereas one gigabyte equals eight gigabits.
No official decision by Apple to raise iPhone prices in 2027 has been announced. However, higher memory costs present the company with two primary options: absorb part of the increased expense or pass it on to consumers via higher retail prices. The iPhone 18 and iPhone Air 2—both expected to launch in spring 2027 per the report—are positioned as early indicators of how memory cost inflation may affect Apple’s next-generation devices.
These pressures are not unique to Apple. Other smartphone manufacturers face identical challenges, including Samsung itself, which both supplies memory chips to multiple OEMs and incorporates those same components into its own smartphones.
