Apple raises iPad and Mac prices as memory costs surge
Apple’s 11-inch iPad Air jumped to $749, turning a sub-$500 deal into a sharper bargain against a broad reset in Apple’s pricing.
Apple lifted prices on Macs and iPads on June 25, pushing the 11-inch iPad Air from $599 to $749 and the base iPad from $349 to $449 as memory and storage costs climbed on AI-data-center demand. Apple’s online store briefly went down before returning with the new pricing, a reminder that the change was not limited to one model or one sale.
The price move is reshaping how buyers read Apple discounts. The M3 iPad Air launched on March 4, 2025, with preorders that day and availability beginning March 12, starting at $599 for the 11-inch model and $799 for the 13-inch model. Apple now lists those same configurations at $749 and $949, respectively, with 128GB as the base storage option. That means a current under-$500 M3 iPad Air deal is not just a markdown from last year’s launch price; it is a deeper break from Apple’s new price floor.
That shift matters because the latest round of discounts landed as Prime Day 2026 ran from June 23 to June 26. By the final day, some iPad Air offers were still live, but the strongest deals were beginning to disappear. For buyers trying to separate a genuine bargain from a temporary sale, the key comparison is no longer only the sticker price at checkout. It is the gap between a retail discount and Apple’s freshly higher list price.
Apple’s pricing change also reverberated in the market. CNBC said Apple shares fell more than 6% on June 25, the company’s worst daily drop since April 2025, after the hikes were announced. Apple said it had never seen component prices rise this much, this quickly, underscoring how the surge in memory costs tied to AI infrastructure is now being passed through to consumers in a visible way.
For shoppers, that makes the discounted M3 iPad Air look less like a routine gadget sale and more like a hedge against a broader price reset. The older model is still cheaper than the newest list price, but Apple’s own June increase has widened the value gap and raised the cost of waiting.
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