Apple might adopt a clever strategy to paper over the fact that selling the base MacBook Neo at $599 is increasingly becoming uneconomical, forcing a switch to higher-tier storage options where an elevated cost pass-through is much more feasible.
Apple might cushion the blow from an effective $100 price increase for the MacBook Neo by introducing new color options
As most of our readers would know by now, the MacBook Neo is powered by the binned A18 Pro chips, where one GPU core is disabled.
Even so, Apple has been shocked by the oncoming demand for its new budget MacBook, and is now planning to increase production for 2026 from the previously envisaged 5 - 6 million units to 10 million units.
To do so, however, Apple has been forced to ask TSMC to restart production of the A18 Pro chips, which comes at a hefty cost. Moreover, the fact that these new chips won't be binned only adds to the overall cost.
To make matters worse, the ongoing AI-driven memory 'chipflation,' where the baseline cost of a typical LPDDR5 module is currently hovering at around $10/GB but is set to eclipse $19/GB by next year, is not helping in the least.
Against this backdrop, Culpian newsletter's Tim Culpan has just disclosed that Apple might pull the $599 base variant of the MacBook Neo soon, following a series of similar steps in relation to the Mac Studio and Mac mini, where the base M4 Mac mini and the 256GB M3 Ultra Mac Studio have both been pulled recently.
In doing so, Apple will have implemented a stealth $100 price increase by pushing users towards the pricier 512GB tier. To paper over any residual resentment, Apple might debut new color options for the higher storage tiers of the MacBook Neo.
About the author: Writing is my one incontrovertible passion. Over the past six years, he has authored over 2,200 distinct articles on financial and tech-related topics, spanning nearly 1 million words. And he has been a member of Wcctech mobile team since 2025. As an alumnus of the University of Toronto, Rotman Commerce Program, I bring nuance, in-depth knowledge, and a unique perspective to every topic that I cover. When I'm not writing, I'm traveling the world, exploring hidden confectionaries and restaurants as an aspiring food connoisseur.
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