We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly
Overnight, Australians discovered that the devices they had long taken for granted now carried prices that quietly announced a new era. Apple and Microsoft, two pillars of the consumer technology world, raised prices on laptops, tablets, and gaming consoles — not out of ambition, but out of necessity, as the insatiable appetite of artificial intelligence for memory chips has created a shortage severe enough to earn its own name. What is unfolding is less a corporate decision than a structural reckoning: the economics that made personal computing accessible are being rewritten by forces far larger than any single company, and the full cost of the AI revolution is beginning to arrive at the checkout.
- Australians woke to find MacBook and iPad prices had climbed overnight by up to 25%, with no Apple laptop now available for under $1,000 — a threshold that once defined entry-level accessibility.
- The culprit is 'RAMageddon' — a global memory chip shortage so acute that storage costs have nearly tripled, driven by AI datacentres consuming chips at a scale the consumer market cannot absorb.
- Microsoft moved in parallel, raising Xbox prices by up to $218 and quietly discontinuing its 2TB model, signalling that the pressure is industry-wide and not easily reversed.
- Retailers like JB Hi-Fi scrambled to offload old stock at pre-hike prices, buying customers a brief window before the new economics fully take hold.
- Analysts warn the iPhone is next — with September's iPhone 18 launch expected to mark the moment Apple's flagship product joins the upward spiral.
- The deeper question is no longer about this cycle of increases, but whether affordable consumer devices can ever be rebuilt around what may now be permanently higher costs.
On Friday morning, Australians opened their browsers to find Apple's prices had climbed overnight. The MacBook Air 13-inch rose from $1,799 to $2,099. iPads jumped 25 percent across the lineup. Apple's explanation was blunt: a global surge in chip costs driven by artificial intelligence demand — a shortage analysts had named RAMageddon — had finally pushed the company past the point of absorption.
The increases swept across the entire product range. The MacBook Neo, launched just three months earlier as Apple's most affordable laptop at $899, now started at $1,049. For the first time, no Apple laptop could be bought directly from the company for under $1,000. iPad prices rose across every tier, the iMac jumped to $2,399, and the Mac Studio to $4,299. The iPhone was spared — for now. But analysts, including JB Hi-Fi chief executive Nick Wells, predicted that reprieve would end when the iPhone 18 arrives in September.
Microsoft moved in lockstep, raising Xbox console prices by up to $218 Australian dollars and discontinuing its 2TB model entirely. The company said storage and memory costs had nearly tripled and were expected to double again by late 2027. Both companies framed the increases not as choices but as consequences.
The structural cause runs deeper than any single product cycle. AI datacentres are consuming memory chips at a scale that has fundamentally disrupted supply for consumer electronics. IDC analyst Soo Kyoum Kim put the stakes plainly: the question is whether the economics of affordable devices can ever be rebuilt around structurally higher memory costs, or whether prices have simply shifted upward for good.
Australian retailers had not yet updated their own pricing by Friday afternoon, with JB Hi-Fi actively promoting deals at older prices — a last window before the new reality fully settles in. Apple's share price fell 6.15 percent on Thursday, erasing $250 billion in market value. The question now is not whether other products will follow, but how far and how fast the new floor will rise.
On Friday morning, Australians opened their browsers to find Apple's prices had climbed overnight. The MacBook Air 13-inch, which had cost $1,799 just hours before, now started at $2,099. iPads jumped 25 percent across the lineup. The company blamed the increases on a global surge in computer chip costs driven by artificial intelligence demand—a shortage so severe that industry analysts had given it a name: RAMageddon.
Apple's statement was stark: "We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly." The company said it had been absorbing rising costs for months but had finally reached a breaking point. The MacBook Pro 14-inch climbed to $3,199. The smaller MacBook Neo, which arrived in Australia just three months earlier marketed as the company's "most affordable laptop ever" at $899, now started at $1,049. For the first time, there were no Apple laptops available directly from the company for under $1,000. iPad pricing shifted across the entire range—the base model from $599 to $749, the mini from $799 to $949, the Air from $999 to $1,249, and the Pro from $1,699 to $1,999. The iMac desktop jumped to $2,399, and the Mac Studio to $4,299.
The iPhone range, Apple's flagship product, remained untouched for now. But analysts predicted that reprieve would not last. Nick Wells, chief executive of JB Hi-Fi, had warned investors in February that the chip shortage was driving 20 percent price increases across personal computers, and that phones were vulnerable to the same pressures. When Apple releases the iPhone 18 in September, Wells suggested, prices would likely follow the same upward trajectory.
Microsoft moved in lockstep. On Thursday US time, the company announced it would raise Xbox console prices by $100 to $145 Australian dollars for the 512GB model and $150 to $218 for the 1TB version. It would stop selling the 2TB model altogether. Storage and memory prices had nearly tripled, Microsoft said, and were expected to double again by late 2027. "We hoped another price increase would not be necessary," the company stated, "and we have spent the last several months working with suppliers on options."
The underlying cause was a structural shift in global computing demand. Datacentres powering artificial intelligence systems consume vast quantities of memory chips. The boom in AI development had created a shortage so acute that it threatened to permanently reshape how consumer electronics were priced and produced. Soo Kyoum Kim, an analyst at International Data Corporation, warned that the economics of affordable devices were being rewritten in real time. "The real question," Kim said, "is whether the product economics of affordable devices can be rebuilt around structurally higher memory costs, or whether product mix and prices shift permanently upward."
Australian retailers had not yet passed on Apple's increases by Friday afternoon. Officeworks said it was "currently working through Apple's recent pricing changes." JB Hi-Fi, however, immediately promoted deals—the MacBook Air 13-inch at $1,597, the MacBook Pro 14-inch at $2,797, and the iPad at $495—suggesting the retailer was trying to clear stock at older prices before the new economics took hold. Apple's share price fell 6.15 percent on Thursday US time, erasing $250 billion from the company's market value and closing at $4 trillion. The question now was not whether other products would follow, but when, and how far prices would ultimately climb.
Citações Notáveis
We have never seen a component price increase this much, this quickly.— Apple
The real question is whether the product economics of affordable devices can be rebuilt around structurally higher memory costs, or whether product mix and prices shift permanently upward.— Soo Kyoum Kim, International Data Corporation analyst
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
Why did Apple wait so long to raise prices if chip costs have been climbing for months?
They said they were absorbing the costs themselves. But there's a limit to how much a company can eat before it has to pass it to customers. Apple reached that limit.
Is this just Apple and Microsoft, or is this happening everywhere?
It's everywhere. But these two companies are big enough that when they move, people notice. Smaller manufacturers have probably already raised prices. The real story is that this isn't temporary—analysts think the cost structure has permanently shifted.
What's driving the shortage? Is it just AI hype, or is something structural actually broken?
Datacentres need enormous amounts of memory to run AI systems. That demand is real and it's not going away. The shortage got so bad they named it RAMageddon. It's not a supply chain hiccup—it's a fundamental mismatch between what the world wants to compute and what chip makers can produce.
So when the iPhone prices go up in September, will people just accept it?
That's the question nobody can answer yet. Phones are different from laptops. People upgrade them more frequently. If the price jumps 20 percent, some people will hold onto their old phones longer. That changes the entire market.
Are retailers like JB Hi-Fi going to absorb some of these costs?
They're trying to clear old stock at old prices right now. But eventually they'll have to raise prices too. They don't have the margin to absorb a 20 percent cost increase for long.