A teardown of iPhone 14 models reveals that pricier parts were used in the newer phones compared to previous generations.

Nikkei Asia’s teardown of the iPhone 14, 14 Pro, and 14 Pro Max shows production costs have soared about 20 per cent, the highest cost-per-unit the company has dealt with to date, as well as the largest leap in cost price from the previous generation.

Apple have seemingly eaten the majority of these costs, leaving the price unchanged from the iPhone 13 in key markets China and the US. Apple did, however, raise the price in various markets, including Australia, the UK, Japan, and Germany, which is likely due to these rising production costs.

The new A16 Bionic chips used in the iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max models are the major culprits, with the proprietary chip costing A$149, compared to the A$62 the A15 cost. These are manufactured by both Samsung Electronics and TSMC.

In addition, new camera parts, including Sony’s CMOS image sensors, are priced about 50 per cent higher than the iPhone 13’s parts, at A$20.4 per part.

All up, Minatake Kashio of Fomalhaut Techno Solutions, a Tokyo-based research company who worked on the research, estimates that production of the iPhone 14 Pro Max, purely based on the price of parts, cost A$680, roughly $81 more than the iPhone 13 Pro Max.

“Apple evidently has no other choice but resort to a strategy of mounting high-performance devices to differentiate itself as it cannot compete on new functions,” said Kashio.