Samsung might have to hike the pricing of its upcoming flagship series, and if you’re a regular Android Police reader, that shouldn’t really come as a surprise.
Thanks to the global shortage of semiconductor supplies, the South Korean tech giant is struggling to price its upcoming devices, and it might just have to begin passing additional costs onto the customer.
According to a late-December report coming directly out of South Korea, Samsung was struggling to reduce costs. This was “due to the continued rise in the price of key components, including semiconductors.” Additionally, “rising prices and intensifying competition also led to increased labor and marketing costs compared to previous years, making it difficult to set reasonable device sales prices.”
Things don’t seem to have changed, and that was essentially confirmed by Wonjin Lee, president and head of global marketing, Samsung, in a recent Bloomberg interview.
Prices are going up even as we speak. Obviously, we don’t want to convey that burden to the consumers, but we’re going to be at a point where we have to actually consider repricing our products.
US buyers might dodge the bullet
The Samsung Galaxy S26 may cost more, but not everywhere
US customers may be exempt from the price bump
This comes soon after Samsung’s DRAM division broke revenue records with $19.2 billion in DRAM revenue in Q4, 2025, as highlighted in a CounterPoint report (via 9to5Google).
Considering that the tech giant makes its own memory, and is still struggling to price its upcoming device, it doesn’t paint a very pretty picture for those brands that don’t manufacture their own memory chips and rely on others. Which somewhat explains Samsung’s DRAM division’s record-breaking revenue figures.
Although not entirely certain, Samsung might deploy a unique strategy to hike pricing, all while keeping high sales volume. According to a recent report, Samsung might hike pricing in its home market of South Korea, all while leaving US prices unchanged. Considering that Samsung has more total sales volume and revenue in the USA, the reported decision makes sense.
Will you be picking up a new S26 series device despite a possible price hike? Or will you be opting for a different flagship? Let us know in the comments below.
