Samsung Galaxy S26 Series Might Get a Price Hike

If you’ve been waiting for Samsung’s next Galaxy flagship, you might want to start saving a little extra. The Galaxy S26 series could arrive with higher prices than this year’s S25 lineup.

That’s not official yet, but several industry reports say Samsung’s costs have gone up — and that usually means higher prices for everyone else too.

Why Prices Might Go Up

The short version? Making a smartphone is getting more expensive.

People familiar with Samsung’s supply chain told Korean outlet ETNews that the company’s production costs have climbed across almost every major part. Chipsets, camera modules, and memory — all the expensive stuff inside — now cost more than they did just a few months ago.

Samsung’s own financial filings show that the price of its mobile processors rose by about 12%, while camera parts went up around 8%. Memory, which has been a problem for nearly every phone maker lately, is also seeing double-digit increases.

And it’s not just Samsung. Apple, Oppo, and Xiaomi are dealing with the same thing. The iPhone 17 launched at higher prices this year, and even mid-range brands like Redmi and Vivo have quietly raised theirs.

The AI Boom Is to Blame (At Least Partly)

Here’s where things get a little weird. The same technology powering ChatGPT and other AI tools is making your next smartphone more expensive.

AI servers use something called high-bandwidth memory, or HBM. It’s a more powerful type of memory used for training big language models and other AI systems. Since that’s where the big money is right now, chipmakers are focusing their production on those high-end components.

The result? There’s less regular smartphone memory being made, and that shortage is driving prices up. Reports suggest that the price of LPDDR5 memory — the kind used in most flagship phones — has jumped 15–20% this year.

Samsung, which builds both its own chips and memory, is caught in the same storm. The Galaxy S26 series is expected to use the Exynos 2600 in some regions and Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 in others. Both are new, cutting-edge processors built on smaller, more advanced 2nm and 3nm processes — which means they’re faster, but also more expensive to produce.

What It Means for the S26 Series

If you look at how Samsung’s pricing has changed in recent years, the trend is clear. The S25 series was priced roughly the same as the S24 lineup, even as manufacturing costs rose slightly. That balance might not hold this time.

The new Galaxy S26, S26+, and S26 Ultra are likely to cost more when they launch early next year. Most reports point to a February 2026 launch in San Francisco, which would mark Samsung’s first in-person Unpacked event in the city since 2023.

No official numbers yet, but if the Galaxy S25 started around ₹80,999 in India, the S26 could cross ₹85,000 or higher. The S26 Ultra, the top model, might get closer to ₹1.3 lakh.

Check out the full specifications of the lineup here.

What Buyers Can Do

If you were planning to upgrade, it might be worth keeping an eye on the Galaxy S25 series once the new models launch. Prices for older flagships often dip around that time, and the performance gap isn’t always massive.