The iPhone 17 Pro could cost an extra $200 this year

Macworld

With Apple’s “Awe Dropping” event just days away, there isn’t much we don’t know about the upcoming iPhone 17 lineup. But a new report today could bring an unpleasant surprise for people looking to buy an iPhone 17 Pro next week.

According to TrendForce, both iPhone 17 Pro phones will feature the A19 Pro chip, along with 12GB of RAM (up from 8GB on the iPhone 16 Pro phones) and a minimum 256GB of storage. With the smaller Pro’s 128GB option gone, its price would be expected to jump accordingly. However, TrendForce’s report expects the new phone to start at $1,199, a full $200 more than the previous Pro model.

That’s a surprisingly big increase. Apple previously bumped the price of the iPhone 15 Pro Max by $100, from $1,099 to $1,199, when it added a then-exclusive 5X optical zoom camera and eliminated the 128GB storage option. The smaller iPhone Pro got the same camera last year, but kept its lower price and storage option–until now.

TrendForce reports that Apple will also increase the price of the iPhone 17 Pro Max to $1,299, even though it will come with the same starting allocation of storage as the 16 Pro Max did last year.

Pricing for the new iPhones has been difficult to predict because of several factors, including tariffs and the introduction of the iPhone 17 Air. Several reports have claimed Apple will hike the Pro models by $50-$100, but TrendForce is the first to predict such a high price for the smaller Pro. TrendForce, like others, expects the standard iPhone 17 to retain its $799 starting price.

It may be worth noting that TrendForce predicted that the iPhone 16 Pro would start at $1,099, yet Apple retained its $999 price tag. So take this latest prediction with a pinch of salt.