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Govt increases import duty on smartphones, iPhones expensive by 4%

In a bid to protect domestic manufacturers and encourage domestic manufacture and assembling, Indian Government announced on Friday a hike in import duty on electronic items including smartphones. So, from now on imported smartphones will cost more as customs duty being increased to 15% from 10% as per the Finance Ministry’s notification.

The move will impact companies that were importing smartphones to sell in India. According to industry experts, smartphone makers like Apple and Lenovo will face the maximum impact of this decision as they are the most import-dependent.

Apple products such as iPhones will become more expensive in comparison to domestic and some China-based manufacturers which assemble a lot in the country, including Samsung. On the other hand, Apple imports nearly 88% of the phones it sells in India, so the company has no option but to increase the prices after the government’s decision.

Apple has updated the prices across the entire iPhones except for the iPhone SE as the device is being assembled in India already since June.

New Prices of Apple iPhone models

Apple has said that the prices will see an average hike of 3.5 percent across its iPhone range. For example, the iPhone X’s starting model, priced at Rs 89,000, will cost Rs 92,430 now. The new prices of some of the iPhone models can be seen in the table below.

iPhone Model Old Price New Price
iPhone X 256GB 102,000 105,720
iPhone X 64GB 89,000 92,430
iPhone 8 Plus 256GB 86,000 88,750
iPhone 8 Plus 64GB 73,000 75,450
iPhone 8 256GB 77,000 79,420
iPhone 8 64GB 64,000 66,120
iPhone 7 Plus 128GB 68,000 70,180
iPhone 7 Plus 32GB 59,000 61,060
iPhone 7 128GB 58,000 59,910
iPhone 7 32GB 49,000 50,810
iPhone SE 128GB 35,000 35,000
iPhone SE 32GB 26,000 26,000

 

Apple has updated the new prices while the other companies are yet to work out the exact price hike. You should also note that the prices mentioned are MRPs from the company. Notably, almost all iPhone models are available at lower prices via offline and online retail channels due to some cashback or other ongoing offers.

The Government’s notification has said customs duty has increased from 10 percent to 20 percent on electronic items including video recording equipment and television cameras. So, we can see the price hike in television sets, digital cameras, microwave ovens, LED bulbs and a number of other electronics goods as well apart from imported mobile phones.

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Satyendra Pal Singh

Satyendra explores the latest happenings in the tech world and writes stories about those. He likes to play around with the latest gadgets and shares his views through articles. In his free time, you can find him watching movies/TV shows and/or reading books.

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