Apple has raised the prices of MacBooks and iPads by nearly 20%, blaming an “unprecedented” surge in memory and storage chip costs driven by the AI industry’s data centre buildout. The iPhone maker said it could no longer shield customers from the increases, which took the starting price of its lowest-priced laptop, the Neo, from $599 to $699 mere months after launch. A MacBook Air with 512GB of storage went up $200, while a MacBook Pro with 1 terabyte became $300 more expensive. “We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly,” Apple said in a statement. “We have shielded our customers from these increases so far, but we have now reached a point where we need to begin raising prices on a number of products.” Shares of Apple fell nearly 5% on the day.
Hours later, Microsoft-owned Xbox announced its second console price hike in less than a year, saying the “components crisis” had forced it to raise the price of its basic console by $100 (£75) to $499, and the higher-memory version by $150 to $749. New prices take effect in August. The company said it had “hoped another price increase would not be necessary”, but the cost of memory and storage had already more than doubled, and it expected costs to double again by 2027. The increases mean an Xbox console now costs 30% to 40% more than it did this time last year.
“Apple and Xbox raise prices by up to 20% amid unprecedented component cost surge driven by AI chip demand.”
The moves come as the electronics industry grapples with soaring demand for RAM and storage chips, which are being snapped up by data centres powering the AI boom. Memory prices rose 98% in the first quarter of 2026 and are expected to jump another 58% to 63% in the current quarter, according to industry tracker TrendForce – a surge analysts have dubbed “Ram-ageddon”. Tech analyst Paolo Pescatore said Apple’s price rises showed that “the AI boom was now affecting consumer electronics” and demonstrated the scale of the challenge “even for the world’s biggest technology companies”.
Valve, meanwhile, launched its Steam Machine gaming PC at a higher price than expected, citing soaring component costs. The device – a PC-console hybrid – retails at £879 in the UK and $1,049 in the US. “The overall effect is that our original goal for the price of Steam Machine is no longer viable,” Valve said. Piers Harding-Rolls of Ampere Analysis said the market research firm had estimated a starting price between $700 and $800, but rising costs meant “Valve has been unable to deliver a more accessible price point to consumers”. He described the Steam Machine, priced 75% more than a PS5, as a “niche offering”.
Analysts now expect Apple to raise iPhone prices later this year. “The iPhone isn’t spared. Its hike is coming,” said Nabila Popal, a senior research director at IDC. “It was incredibly strategic for Apple to make the price hike announcements prior to the iPhone fall launch, so the headlines at launch is not the price hikes but the value the new phones bring.”