Will Trump tariffs make Apple iPhones more expensive?

U.S. President Donald Trump imposed a series of sweeping tariffs on countries around the world that could drastically alter the landscape of global trade, and consumer goods like iPhones could be among the hardest hit, analysts said on Thursday.
Most iPhones are still made in China, which was hit with a 54% tariff. If those levies persist, Apple has a tough choice: absorb the extra expense or pass it on to customers.

Shares of the company were down more than 8% in the wake of the tariff announcements, putting them on track for their worst day since September 2020.

Apple sells more than 220 million iPhones a year; its biggest markets include the United States, China and Europe.

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The cheapest iPhone 16 model was launched in the U.S. with a sticker price of $799, but could cost as much as $1,142, per calculations based on projections from analysts at Rosenblatt Securities, who say the cost could rise by 43% — if Apple is able to pass that on to consumers.

Trump imposed tariffs on a wide range of Chinese imports in his first term as president to pressure U.S. companies to bring manufacturing either back to the United States or to nearby countries such as Mexico, but Apple secured exemptions or waivers for several products. This time, he has not yet granted any exemptions.

«This whole China tariff thing is playing out right now completely contrary to our expectation that American icon Apple would be kid-gloved, like last time,» Barton Crockett, analyst at Rosenblatt Securities, said in a note.

The iPhone 16e, launched in February as a cheaper entry point for Apple's suite of artificial-intelligence features, costs $599. A 43% price hike could push that cost to $856. Prices of other Apple devices could