William Gallagher
A new report claims that the manufacturing cost of the 2nm processor expected in the iPhone 18 range may mean Apple having to raise prices.
It's bad enough that tariffs may still force Apple to raise prices, and it's bad enough that the expected iPhone Fold will cost over $2,000. Now a further report backs up previous claims that the whole iPhone 18 range may be costlier than its predecessors.
Backing up a report from September 2024, leaker "Digital Chat Station" has now claimed on Weibo that there could be significant price increases for the 2026 iPhone models.
"Next year, Apple/Qualcomm/Mittec will be launched on TSMC 2nm," writes the leaker on Weibo (in translation). "It is expected that the cost will increase significantly, and the price of the new machine may increase again."
The reason is specifically the manufacturing cost of the new 2nm processor. In the September 2024 report by analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, it was initially said that the costs were high in part because of the low yield of the production process.
Kuo at first claimed that this meant Apple would limit the 2nm processor to the iPhone 18 Pro, and it was conceivable that it would actually only be in the iPhone 18 Pro Max.
However, in March 2025, Kuo revised his prediction because of what he said were greatly improved yields. He said that TSMC had reached 60% to 70% yields by January 2025, and by March were "well above that."
Consequently, Kuo then believed that it was possible Apple would use the 2nm processor across the entire iPhone 18 range. That fit with claims from other analysts, too.
If correct, the benefit of the 2nm processor is that it should provide between a 10% and 15% performance boost over the forthcoming iPhone 17 range. However, if Digital Chat Station is correct, it will also bring an unknown price hike.
Note that Digital Chat Station has a fairly good track record for Apple leaks. Most recently, he or she has been reporting about under-display Face ID for a foldable iPad, and also for the iPhone fold.
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Christine McKee
Charles Martin
Malcolm Owen
Marko Zivkovic
27 Comments
Maybe they’ll soften the blow of a higher price with a three month trial of Apple Deli+
“Unknown price hike”
Stop.
yeah, there's that and the predatory American president on his revenge tour
That's a problem mainly because the speed of existing processors is more than sufficient to meet the needs of the vast majority of users. Really fast upgraded to faster still, in real-world use, adds up to no discernible upgrade. Asking consumers who already are facing substantial price increases to pay more for essentially nothing doesn't appear to be a good grasp of what will best serve consumers. In the end, the key to success does lie in making your customers happy. Charging more with nothing to show for it is not how you do that. As the price of acquiring the latest and greatest goes up, it motivates consumers to think hard about upgrading from a working iPhone. So if Apple goes to a higher price point with its iPhone line, it will not end well for Apple. The only way this would work would be if there was compelling functionality added to the iPhone experience as a result of a processor upgrade. Current processors are so capable that it seems unlikely this will happen.
Which rumor are we judging?
The front page says "probably going to make iPhone 18 extremely expensive."
The headline on this page says "could drive prices up."
The first sentence says "
The click-bait headline is almost surely wrong. If the new processor is "extremely expensive," Apple would only use it for the highest end phone. Nothing is forcing Apple to use a 2nm processor if it's not available at a market-viable price.