Apple has now said out loud what buyers in India worked out in June: the Apple price increase on Macs and iPads was driven by memory. On the company’s Q3 2026 earnings call on 30 July — Tim Cook’s last as chief executive — Cook told analysts Apple “reluctantly” raised prices because the cost of DRAM and NAND has gone vertical, and warned that Apple expects to pay even more for memory in the September quarter.
What Cook actually said about memory pricing
Asked about the pricing changes, Cook gave the clearest explanation Apple has offered so far. As transcribed by MacRumors, he said:
On the pricing front, you know, we reluctantly raised prices. I would say we did it because we’re in what I would characterize as a 100-year flood on memory pricing with exponential increases in memory prices, so that was the rationale for it.
Cook added that Apple paid more for memory in the March quarter than in December, significantly more in the June quarter than in March, and expects higher costs again in September — partially offset by inventory bought earlier and by cheaper non-memory components. CFO Kevan Parekh told analysts memory costs account for more than the entire sequential decline in the company’s adjusted gross margin between the March quarter and the midpoint of September-quarter guidance.
Cook did not say whether iPhone prices will rise when this September’s models land. He also warned that supply constraints are expected to increase significantly next quarter, hitting Macs hardest.
What the Apple price increase looks like in India
Apple revised prices globally from late June, and Indian buyers absorbed the change with import duty and GST layered on top. Checked against Apple’s own India store today, the current entry prices are:
- MacBook Air (M5): from ₹1,49,900
- MacBook Pro (M5): from ₹2,39,900
- iPad Air: from ₹89,900
Indian outlets that tracked the June revision, including Goodreturns and DSIJ, reported increases ranging from roughly ₹5,000 to about ₹70,000 depending on the model, with the MacBook Pro seeing the largest single jump and some iPad Air configurations rising by over 40 per cent. Apple does not publish before-and-after price lists, so treat those deltas as reported figures rather than company-confirmed ones — but the current prices above are what you pay at apple.com/in right now.
Why memory got this expensive
This is the same squeeze we covered in July when RAM and laptop prices in India started climbing. Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron have shifted a large share of wafer capacity to High Bandwidth Memory for AI data centres, which pays far better per wafer than consumer DDR5 and NAND. Ordinary memory got squeezed out of the production queue, and every device that contains RAM or flash storage — not just Apple’s — is now more expensive to build.
So Cook’s explanation is, on the facts, true. That is worth stating plainly before the criticism.
The part Apple’s framing leaves out
Memory being expensive is an industry condition. What Apple controls is how much of it you are forced to buy from Apple, and at what markup. RAM and SSD in every current Mac are soldered to the board, so the only way to get more is to pay Apple’s upgrade tier at purchase — a tier that has historically carried a margin far above the spot price of the chips inside. When component costs spike, a buyer with a socketed PC can wait out the cycle, buy a cheaper stick later, or upgrade in two years. A Mac buyer cannot. The base configuration you can afford today is the configuration you own for the life of the machine.
That is the real cost of the “100-year flood” for an Indian buyer: not just a higher sticker, but a higher sticker on a device whose most expensive component you can never top up. Apple’s own press release calls this its strongest June quarter ever, with iPhone, Mac and Services revenue all setting new June-quarter records, so the price increases have not dented demand — which is precisely why there is no commercial pressure to reverse them.
What to do if you are buying now
If you need a Mac or iPad this quarter, Cook’s own guidance is the useful signal: Apple expects memory to cost more in September, not less, and expects supply constraints to worsen. Waiting is unlikely to get you a cheaper machine in the near term, though it may get you a newer one. If you can live with the previous generation, authorised resellers and Apple’s own refurbished store often carry pre-revision stock at older pricing. And if you are choosing between configurations, spend on storage and memory now rather than assuming you can add it later — on a Mac, you cannot.
Sources: MacRumors, Tom’s Guide, Apple Newsroom
