Apple raised its prices, then offered to rent you the phone instead
Apple has a new answer to the complaint that its products cost too much. Do not buy them. Lease them.
On Tuesday the company launched Apple Upgrade in the US, a leasing programme run by the buy-now-pay-later firm Klarna. It covers the iPhone, Apple Watch, Mac and iPad, and it starts at $17.99 a month for an iPhone. It also quietly retires the iPhone Upgrade Program Apple has run since 2015.
The timing is the tell. In June, Apple raised Mac and iPad prices by $100 to more than $1,000, blaming the AI-driven memory shortage. It warned that iPhone rises were coming. Cook called the increases unavoidable. Six weeks later, the fix is not a lower price. It is a smaller-looking one.
The price does not change. The feeling does.
Leasing does not make an iPhone cheaper. It makes it feel cheaper. A $1,099 iPhone 17 Pro becomes $31.99...
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