Apple is considering a price hike on its iPhone 17 lineup when it debuts in the fall of 2025, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal that was published earlier this morning on May 12.
Keen minds will note that the timing in the midst of a US-China trade war points the finger, at least partially, toward the tariff situation the US has placed on goods manufactured in China.
Apple, with all its trillions, isn’t immune to the pressure. It isn’t keen to blame the rumored price hikes on the tariff situation, though. Rather, as the WSJ reports, Apple is looking to “find reasons other than tariffs to explain the move.”
tariff whiplash
The US and China agreed on a 90-day suspension of all but 10% of the recent tariffs that went into effect on April 2, 2025, which were the primary driver of the US-China trade war that’s caused stocks to whipsaw up and down violently over the past month.
In addition, the retaliatory tariffs that went into place and ratcheted up the trade war in the days following have been permanently brushed aside, as the White House’s press release states. That still leaves a 20% tariff in place on electronics coming into the US from China.
Don’t let the walk-down from the 145% tariffs on Chinese goods until now fool you into thinking that a 20% tariff is low, though. That’s still a significant tariff, and it stands to impact any manufacturer making their electronics in China quite a bit.
“The company is determined to avoid any scenario in which it appears to attribute price increases to U.S. tariffs on goods from China, where most Apple devices are assembled, the people said,” the WSJ writes.
As the WSJ says, “(Apple CEO Tim Cook) said earlier this month that a majority of iPhones shipped to the U.S. in the April-to-June quarter would come from India.” Whether that’s a permanent move, though, or that Apple will shift back some of the US’ supply to iPhones made in China later this year remains to be seen.
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