Technologies

Could the iPhone’s Price Double With Trump’s New 125% Tariff? We Do the Math

Trump dumped other countries’ tariffs for now but bumped China up to 125%. Experts advise against panic-buying if it puts you in debt.

US President Donald Trump pressed pause on «reciprocal tariffs» this week, but he upped the levy on goods from China to 125% in the latest escalation of the two countries’ trade war. Experts say you should expect to pay more for your next iPhone.

Trump announced the 90-day pause on his social media platform for all countries except China because «these countries have not, at my strong suggestion, retaliated in any way, shape or form.» China, where Apple produces most of its products, has responded to each of Trump’s tariff hikes this year by increasing tariffs on US products.

«Trump is playing hardball with China, which is unsettling on many levels,» Patti Brennan, certified financial planner and CEO of Key Financial, said in an email. «As for Apple, expect the prices to double for their products.»

Apple has started to move some of its manufacturing to other countries, including India and Vietnam. Those countries were supposed to be hit with their own tariffs today — Vietnam with a 46% tariff hike and India a 26% increase — but were among the reprieved. Trump left in place a 10% baseline tariff on imports.

And though experts don’t expect costs to rise on a 1-to-1 basis with tariffs on goods from China — and other countries after the pause expires — you should expect significant increases. It’s unclear, however, exactly how much of an impact the tariffs will actually have on prices. If rising prices cause demand to plummet, experts note that Apple and other producers could reduce their prices to stay competitive.

If you’re in the market for a new Apple device or an imported gaming system, like the Nintendo Switch 2 or PlayStation 5 Pro, here’s how tariffs could raise prices, and what you should do to prepare.

Read more: Apple Shoppers Are Reportedly Panic Buying iPhones Amid Looming Tariffs

How much could iPhone prices go up with tariffs? We do the math

If the full cost of tariffs were passed on to shoppers, we’d see a 125% increase in prices on Apple products produced in China. Apple has moved some of its production to other countries, but most iPhones are still manufactured in China.

Here’s how it could affect the cost of an iPhone if the full tariffs for China were applied:

How could tariffs on China increase iPhone prices?

	Current price	125% tariff	New price
iPhone 15 (128GB)	$699	$874	$1,573
iPhone 15 Plus (128GB)	$799	$999	$1,798
iPhone 16e (128GB)	$599	$749	$1,348
iPhone 16 (128GB)	$799	$999	$1,798
iPhone 16 Plus (128GB)	$899	$1,124	$2,023
iPhone 16 Pro (128GB)	$999	$1,249	$2,248
iPhone 16 Pro Max (256GB)	$1,199	$1,499	$2,698

But there’s a lot more that goes into the price of an iPhone than simply where it’s manufactured. Apple sources components for its products from a long list of countries, which could face higher tariffs after the pause. And a tariff on goods doesn’t necessarily mean prices will go up by the same amount. If companies want to stay competitive, they could absorb some of the costs to keep their prices lower.

«It won’t be as high as one-to-one in terms of the tariff increases,» said Ryan Reith, group vice president for IDC’s Worldwide Device Tracker suite, which includes mobile phones, tablets and wearables. «The math isn’t as clear cut as that on the tariffs.»

Will other tech products also see price hikes?

Smartphones aren’t the only devices expected to see prices increase because of tariffs. Best Buy and Target warned consumers last month to expect higher prices for everything, after the latest round of tariffs went into effect. February’s tariff hike had already prompted Acer to announce that it was raising prices on its laptops.

Apple announced a $100 price cut on its new MacBook Air last month, a day after the last round of tariffs took effect. In what was widely viewed as an attempt to persuade Trump to «carve out» an exemption from the latest tariffs, Apple announced in February that it would spend more than $500 billion in the next four years to expand manufacturing operations in the US.

«They already committed $500 billion to US manufacturing, and there was no carve out for Apple,» Brennan said. «They will have to pass along most of these costs to consumers.»

However, regardless of the exact amount, expect tariffs on goods from China to translate into higher prices for consumers. That means the tech you use every day, like imported smartphones, tablets, laptops, TVs and kitchen appliances, could get even more expensive this year.

What’s going on with tariffs?

Trump announced a 10% baseline tariff on all imports plus «reciprocal tariffs» on imports from more than 180 countries April 2, which he dubbed «Liberation Day.» He’s long touted tariffs as a way to even the trade deficit and raise revenue to offset tax cuts, although many economists say that tariffs could lead to higher prices and may end up hurting the US economy. Stock prices plummeted after Trump’s announcement as markets reacted poorly to the sweeping tariffs.

Trump has taken an especially hard stance on China, which was already subject to tariffs that Trump ordered during his first term in office. He started in February, imposing 20% in tariffs, then announced last week a 34% tariff on goods from China. Earlier this week, he added another 50% tariff before landing today on the 125% tariff against China. China has responded with its own tariffs after each of Trump’s announcements.

Tariffs, in theory, are designed to financially impact other countries because their goods are being taxed. Tariffs are paid by the US company importing the product, and this upcharge is usually — but not always — passed on to the consumer in the form of higher prices.

Should you buy tech now to avoid tariffs later?

If you were planning to buy a new iPhone, gaming console, MacBook or other tech, buying it now could save you money.

But if you don’t have the cash on hand and need to use a credit card or buy now, pay later plan just to avoid tariffs, experts say to make sure you have the money to cover the costs before you start accruing interest. With credit cards’ average interest rates currently more than 20%, the cost of financing a big purchase could quickly wipe out any savings you’d get by buying before prices go up because of tariffs.

«If you finance this expense on a credit card and can’t pay it off in full in one to two months, you’ll likely end up paying way more than a tariff would cost you,» said Alaina Fingal, an accountant, founder of The Organized Money and a CNET Money Expert Review Board member. «I would recommend that you pause on any big purchases until the economy is more stable.»

One way to save on Apple products, even if prices go up, is to buy last year’s model instead of the newest release.

«If you aren’t planning to upgrade in the next year, there is no need to rush out to buy a new smartphone,» Shawn DuBravac, chief economist at IPC, a manufacturing trade association, said in an email. «Technology is naturally deflationary, meaning that over time performance goes up and prices generally go down for products of similar quality.»

Technologies

Nike Workout Shoes With Compression and Heating Will Cost $900

The Nike Hyperboot shoes will be available next month and are intended to help you warm up before and recover after workouts.

Those warmup compression shoes Nike and Hyperice showed off at CES 2025 finally have a launch date and price. The Hyperboot will be available to buy online in North America starting May 17, for a cost of $899.

The high-tops, which Nike and Hyperice say are a wearable much like your smartwatch, help your feet warm up before and recover after a workout. The footwear does this with heating and air-compression massage technology right there in your shoes, taking the idea of heating pads and compression socks and making them mobile.

CNET former mobile senior writer Lisa Eadicicco got the chance to try these shoes on in January.

«You can definitely feel the heat in here,» Eadicicco said at the time, as she walked across a demo room in Las Vegas wearing the fancy footwear. The boots massage and compress your ankles and feet, and in CNET’s test, we could especially feel the heat around the ankles.

Buttons on the shoes let you adjust compression and the amount of heat, with multiple settings for each.

«The Hyperboot contains a system of dual-air bladders that deliver sequential compression patterns and are bonded to thermally efficient heating elements that evenly distribute heat throughout the shoe’s entire upper,» Nike explains.

The battery lasts for 1 to 1.5 hours on max heat and compression settings, or 8 hours if you’re only using the massage setting. It takes 5 to 6 hours to charge via USB-C cable. The boots come in five sizes: S, M, L, XL and XXL.

Technologies

Marvel Rivals’ New Costume Customization Is Fairly Priced, but There’s a Problem

A couple dollars isn’t much to pay for in-depth skin customization, but you can’t spend your existing Units on the new feature.

Marvel Rivals’ latest Season 2 feature is targeted at all the fashionistas out there. Costume customization lets players change the color palette of their skin, creating a new in-game look that suits them best.

The new palette swap customization isn’t free and isn’t available on every skin, though more skins will be available to customize as time goes on. Four reskins shipped with the feature’s introduction.

Unlocking costume customization will cost you the in-game currency equivalent of $6 per skin, but you can freely change the color to any variation released for a skin you bought customization on as they are released.

The pricing of these reskins is actually generous compared with Rivals’ largest competitor: Overwatch 2. Palette-swapped legendary reskins in Blizzard’s first-person hero shooter have typically cost just as much as the original skin, and unlocking the black-and-gold customization for special Mythic skins costs the equivalent of $20.

The $6 price tag for Marvel Rivals costume customization is a tame monetization practice in comparison. But the biggest problem with the new feature isn’t the price tag — it’s the introduction of Unstable Molecules, which feels like an unnecessary additional currency introduced to lure players into spending more money.

Marvel Rivals is developing a currency bloat problem

There were already three separate currencies to manage in the game, alongside the occasional addition of special tokens that let players interact with limited-time events like Galacta’s Cosmic Adventure.

Of the three existing currencies, most players will interact with Chrono Tokens, the purple currency, as it’s available to free-to-play Marvel Rivals players. These tokens unlock rewards on the battle pass. Whereas most games have experience points that unlock battle pass tiers, Chrono Tokens are a currency that disappears at the end of a season.

Units and Lattice are the current premium currencies in Marvel Rivals. Lattice is the gold coin that you directly pay — most microtransactions convert your money into this currency to spend in-game, at a rate of $1 to 100 Lattice.

Units, the blue currency, are what you need to buy most of the premium costume bundles in the game — so you need to convert your Lattice to Units at a one-to-one exchange rate when you’re buying costumes.

That brings us to the new cosmetics system. As if that wasn’t overly complicated enough, costume customization now requires a new currency: Unstable Molecules. Unstable Molecules aren’t Units, but they might as well be. You exchange Lattice to Unstable Molecules at the same one-to-one rate.

The only difference between these currencies is that you use Units to purchase costumes, emotes, sprays and account name changes, and you use Unstable Molecules to purchase the costume customization feature for skins you already own.

The decision to add another currency for no reason needlessly complicates Marvel Rivals’ microtransactions — and the system was already pretty opaque as it stands. Maybe that’s by design, as trading in multiple fictional currencies helps obscure the real dollar cost that players are sinking into their in-game cosmetics.

The addition of Unstable Molecules feels like an anti-consumer move. The costume customization prices are fair when you compare them with the competition’s asking prices for similar cosmetic tweaks, but the new feature should be bought and paid for with Units. There’s no need to add another currency to Marvel Rivals, unless the entire point is to create another way to obfuscate and inflate player spending.

How to unlock costume customization in Marvel Rivals

You can rock palette-swapped versions of some of your favorite Marvel Rivals costumes right now. Costume customization is live in Marvel Rivals — for a handful of skins. Here are the skins the new feature is compatible with right now:

Magik Punkchild: Rosy Resilience skin variant
Psylocke Vengeance: Phantom Purple skin variant
Luna Snow Mirae 2099: Plasma Pulse skin variant
Winter Soldier Blood Soldier: Winter’s Wrath skin variant

Each costume customization is available for purchase for 600 Unstable Molecules. The customizations are purchasable as part of the costume’s listing under the store tab in the main menu. You need to own the base skin before you can purchase the costume customization color variants.

Unstable Molecules are currently only available in a one-to-one exchange with the Lattice premium currency, but the costume customization announcement in the official Marvel Rivals Discord server mentioned that there will be new ways to earn Unstable Molecules in Season 3.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for April 18, #207

Hints and answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, No. 207, for April 18.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Connections: Sports Edition might be tough today. If you’ve never heard of a particular method for healing an injury, the green group could stump you. And there’s one of those last-name groups that the New York Times loves to throw at players. Read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is out of beta now, making its debut on Super Bowl Sunday, Feb. 9. That’s a sign that the game has earned enough loyal players that The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by the Times, will continue to publish it. It doesn’t show up in the NYT Games app but now appears in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can continue to play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Collectibles.

Green group hint: For an injury.

Blue group hint: Not olds.

Purple group hint: Rock and ____.