Weekend Open Forum: Are flagship smartphones overpriced?

[turismozilla]

Yup, I'm going to buy a Galaxy S8 when the Galaxy S10 hits shelves, yes... I'm cheap like that.

 

[m-tec]

Yup, I'm going to buy a Galaxy S8 when the Galaxy S10 hits shelves, yes... I'm cheap like that.

or your smart! lol

 

[Nobina]

Depends on where you live and how much you earn. In Western Europe and US it's not as big of a deal while Eastern Europe has worse economy and these phones are usually too expensive for them.

Also flagship are not for everyone like supercars are not for everyone. It's a niche that only certain people can afford (That applies more in countries with worse economy). I know there's a big difference between a car and a phone but it's to make a point.

Definetly wanna hear more thoughts on this cause I know some people will **** on me cause they think phones are cheap and worth thousand bucks every year.

 

[Misagt]

All depends on where the money went. Did it go into the phone or just into advertising. If you bought something just cause it was on TV remember you helped pay for those ads.

 

[Rockstarrrr]

Also flagship are not for everyone like supercars are not for everyone.

Supercars are usually made in real small numbers - like 10, 100, 1000. Apple sells tens of millions of iPhones EVERY year. No, buying a "flagship" is not like buying a supercar (its not even close) - its what it really is - overpaying device that does the same thing as 5x or 10x cheaper one. Personally, I`m fine with top device costing up to $500 - anything over that is just stupid.

I`m usually in the mid-tier, around 250-300, so-called "best-buy" category. I understand when someone wants iPhone or Galaxy and I`m cool with that - but yeah, they are way overpriced and it seems that a lot of people are having them.

Unlike supercars.

 

[ThanosPAS]

This is a trivially easy question.

If sales are poor and inventory is backing up, the flagship phone is overpriced.

If sales are meeting expectations, the flagship phone is not overpriced.

If sales are exceeding the manufacturer's ability to produce sufficient quantities fast enough to meet demand, the flagship phone is underpriced.

This view is only true if you take into account simple supply/demand economics. While many customers' decision in a versatile economy (...and for a very expensive product) does not get affected only by its price, but also, the value that the product delivers and what the competitors have in store for them. If I am willing to buy, this doesn't mean that I don't recognize that I succumb to my desires and get less in return in terms of components' performance, or that if a competitor starts to offer a handset that is cheaper for a comparable experience I won't swing between them. Meaning that any given figure of sales does not only reflect sound economic decisions, nor easily attributed to a simple price metric. Target groups, the economic environment (how much is much for you based on what you make or your core monetary thinking), influence by people or the media, a sense of economic prosperity and so on, may decide, often enough, where to put money on. You can't easily substitute a whole bunch of motives with a sales figure and pretend that they represent a price action-reaction relationship just because they correlate.

 

[Andy Jones]

If you build it they will come. And marketing works so they come to the established brands for £700, ignoring the near spec-for-spec alternative at £400.

 

[p51d007]

Thought that for YEARS, but, let the market figure this out. If consumers are silly enough to cough up that amount of money every 2-3 year, then so be it.
Most people, can get by with a smartphone, with a 1080 screen, 2-3 GB ram, 32GB storage w/ext SD card, 801EQ processor. 99% just talk, text, photo, mp3's, streaming, Facebook etc.
The "flagship" is overblown hype, for the trendy types.
It amazes me in the past 2-3 decades, consumer electronics, for the most part, gets BETTER, but DROPS in price. Flat screen TV's, PC's, laptops have all come way down in price, but up in performance. Flagship phones, still have a manufacturing cost of 250-300 dollars, but sells routinely for 2-3 times that.
It's YOUR money, if you want to blow it every couple of years chasing a pipe dream, go ahead. Once consumers get wise, the price will have to come down.

 

[p51d007]

Yes they are, some people will always be willing to pay a premium price for a current flagship model purely for the bragging rights and manufacturers will allways take advantage of that. I prefer to buy previous model flagships, that way I'm getting a good quality phone that does what I want without having to pay the inflated price.

Same here. I upgraded from a Mate2 to a Mate8 AFTER Huawei released the Mate9. The 8 dropped almost in half of what it was. It's "the last" of last years high end device, which means any hardware bugs should be taken care of, and the software should be bug free. (which it has been). To me it's a better bang for your buck.

 

[tuffguy]

Just got my S8+ here in Australia which is $1,349 to buy outright. In my view passing the $1,000 mark just makes them too expensive. I just cannot see any value for money now as there is nothing really significantly new to justify the significant bump in price, certainly not manufacturing costs.

 

[ET3D]

As long as people are willing to buy them, they aren't overpriced. There are always cheaper options and yesteryear's models for those who want to pay less.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Yes. I have an iphone SE. It cost $450 for the 64GB model. The iphone 7 cost $650. The SE has better battery life and the same performance as a 6s. The 7 is not $200 better then the SE in any fashion. It cost, what, maybe another $15 to make due to its larger size, and thats about it.

Given that phones are treated as disposable by the companies making them, I would never spend more the $300 on a phone unless it gets extraordinary support (hello iphone with 5 years of updates and an apple store for repairs 10 minutes away).

 

[Timonius]

Yes.

And signing a contract helps artificially drive up those prices. Stop it. Also, I love when people ask: 'apple or samsung?' as if there are only two choices...smh

 

[Archean]

Short answer they are (on Android side); IMHO mostly because of erratic (non-existent) software updates from many OEMs; e.g. I recently received Android 7 update on S7E, whereas, Android 8 is just around the corner; sometimes, security updates doesn't arrive for upto 2/3 months. Not to mention hardware shortcomings e.g. generally inferior CPU/GPU performance compared to iPhones'.

Whereas, on Apple's side, regular updates for 3 years on each model probably justify their pricing far more easily.

 

[forgotten]

The price of flagship phones is going the way of the price of cars. Since most people either lease them or finance them, the retail price tag doesn't matter. It's up to carriers to provide the shiniest new phone for a reasonable monthly price. So, yes, the price of smartphones is getting ridiculous, but I doubt that will change since the majority of people have no idea what the retail price of their phone is, nor do they care to know. They just know that it costs $32 a month and that's just fine with them.

 

[yeeeeman]

Yes.
If the workers involved in building the products would earn a bigger wage then I would accept to pay ridiculous amounts of money for a nice smartphone. But in current times, bosses earn tones of money and employees have to work their *** off to make it happen in a certain amount of time and in a certain bugdet - budget that is computed starting from what they would want to add to their profits next quarter.
That is it, I've said it.

 

[NightAntilli]

iPhones are generally overpriced. The hardware is sub par compared to competitor phones. This has always been the case, but they have no reason to lower because they have a reputation and people will buy it anyway.

Android phones come in a variety of prices. Some might be overpriced, but I think most of them are reasonable, even the flag ship phones. As for the S8 costing $100 than the S7... Well, these phones are cranking more and more technology in basically the same space. Screen sizes are slowly becoming larger, resolution is increasing, the glass quality is increasing, first fingerprint scanners were added, now it's iris scanners... It all racks up. It's not realistic to expect more and more features and the prices remaining the same each year.

Also note that building a phone is not the only thing that adds to the price. All the features must be added into the software as well, and that must also be paid for.

If you really think these phones are overpriced, buy them a year later just before the new one is released.