“The news comes from two famously reliable sources: Mac Otakara which was the first site to state Apple would remove the headphone jack from the iPhone 7 (though I was first to predict it in 2014). And KGI Securities’ Ming-Chi Kuo who is widely regarded as ‘the best Apple analyst on the planet,'” Gordon Kelly writes for Forbes. “Together they complete two halves of an intriguing puzzle: what Apple will do with the iPhone in 2017 – and it is going to cost you.”
“Filling in its half Mac Otakara says Apple will once again only iterate with its 2017 iPhones and an ‘iPhone 7S’ and ‘iPhone 7S Plus’ will look virtually identical to every iPhone since the iPhone 6 in 2014,” Kelly writes. “But before you despair, in jumps Kuo who says the iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus will only be the base models with an all new ‘iPhone 8’ at the top. This will feature a completely overhauled design with no home button, an OLED display, wireless charging and more.”
“Those already struggling to justify the cost of owning an iPhone should probably look away now, because the iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus are expected to retain the current price points of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus ($649 – $969), while the iPhone 8 will sit above them both as the new flagship,” Kelly writes. “Would a circa $1200 256GB iPhone 8 seem overpriced?”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: iPhone is an aspirational device. The loaded flagship model should be priced aspirationally as it increases the perceived value of the brand all the way down the line. We’ll get what we can for our Jet Black 256GB iPhone 7 Plus units (should be a healthy price) and apply the proceeds toward purchasing units of Apple’s next-gen flagship outright, as usual. We just paid $1098 per unit ($969+$129 AppleCare+) per unit before tax, so $1200 wouldn’t be that shocking for the world’s most advanced pocket computer.
