Comment by 1970-01-01
11 hours ago
$599 still feels like they're setting whatever price they can get away with. It's been 20 years, why don't we have sub $500 new iPhones yet?
11 hours ago
$599 still feels like they're setting whatever price they can get away with. It's been 20 years, why don't we have sub $500 new iPhones yet?
Taking inflation into account, a $599 iPhone in 2026 would have been $380 in 2007. Given that the actual launch price in 2007 was $499, that's a pretty hefty drop.
$499 with carrier subsidy too
It didn't take much longer to get a 3G for that price with no subsidy.
A technology doodad getting 25% cheaper in real terms over 15-20 years is about as far opposite as you can get from a hefty price drop.
Sure, it hasn’t crashed like the prices of televisions, or like computers did in the 80s and 90s. But it’s still meaningfully cheaper and of course much more capable (the original iPhone didn’t even launch with an App Store!).
Come on, the iPhone had:
Just to name a few. I won't even go into things like touch/faceID, wireless charging, iCloud, any form of water resistance etc.
And then in terms of the specs on what it did have that got better, processor, memory, storage, screen quality, battery life, camera, it's all orders of magnitude better. There really is no comparison.
I mean look at the price of a digital camera, music player etc, hell even external battery pack in 2007, with the same specs as the iPhone today, and you'll easily find support for using the words 'hefty price drop'.
It's also 10000% more capable too.
1 reply →
> feels like they're setting whatever price they can get away with.
This is just a free market for any product works. No?
Why do software engineers ask for six digit salaries? Because they can get away with it — someone is willing to pay for it.
You asked for it. Now sit back and relish the ripe comments from fruitopologists.
I’m pretty sure they determine the price upfront and then figure out what bells and whistles they can ship without eating into their margins. Their goal is to hit a certain average selling price across their massive user base when they upgrade their old phones. They are not going to jeopardize that by releasing an attractive cheap iPhone.
For the people who really don’t want to spend a lot, obviously the easiest option is to just buy an older iPhone or keep your phone for longer. My partner doesn’t care about having the latest tech. So first I use a phone for 3 years and then they use it for another 3 years. We essentially get 6 years of life out of it (Apple is good about releasing software updates for 6 years).
There is no market for it in US at least since carriers control that selling couple year old iphones for free or close to it.
It's a luxury brand. You don't sell cheap and risk losing the people that are happy to pay $1400 for a new iPhone.
It’s not a luxury brand, it is a quality brand. There is a difference.
The keyboard-doesn't-trigger-the-tapped-key-sometimes brand, just awestruck at their quality https://ios-countdown.win/
> It’s not a luxury brand, it is a quality brand. There is a difference.
It’s an attainable luxury brand. There aren’t many products that a high school kid has in common with billionaires, superstar athletes and movie stars—the iPhone is such a product.
So is Mercedes-Benz. But they don't sell a $20,000 commuter car.
8 replies →
At least they increased the base storage to 256GB
I'd argue that is worth the money if you're going to be using a phone every single day of their life. People will drop a few hundred on fancy shoes and wear them once a month, but they treat phones as cheap commodities.
The iPhone SE was only $400.
Last time I complained about the pricing of the iPhone, people pointed out that inflation included the prices wasn't to far of from the original iPhone.
Still, I don't care that the phones are faster, have larger screens, better camera, FaceID, AI, are thinner light and what have you. The iPhone design peaked in 2015, from there they could just have release the same phone year after year, making it cheaper and cheaper and I'd still be happy with it.
The prices are, in my mind insane, and I'll be buying used, but those are also overpriced.
> Still, I don't care that the phones are faster, have larger screens, better camera, FaceID, AI, are thinner light and what have you. The iPhone design peaked in 2015, from there they could just have release the same phone year after year, making it cheaper and cheaper and I'd still be happy with it.
This obviously isnt relevant generally though, this is not how the general public feels at all.
No, they couldn’t, because then the company would stop existing due to lack of sales.
Bell System released about 10 models over 110 years, worked out just fine for them.
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The first SE in 2016, which wasn’t very far from flagship at the time, was only $399. It was a steal.
Accounting for inflation, that's $542. And considering how much everything, including phones, costs nowadays, $600 seems like a steal to me too. I was expecting a much higher price for what I'm seeing on that page.
Can mess up the price ladder!
Because they know people will pay it.
Global crazy tariffs, supply chain issues, and RAM and storage shortages due to AI hype betting. Also greed.