iPhone 8 ‘Edition’, The Thousand Dollar iPhone

Mar 14, 2017 02:53 PM EDT

The iPhone 8 is more or less going to be an explosive hit, that is for sure. Apple is also extremely good at keeping secrets, which is why it is pretty difficult and challenging to figure out just what exactly is going to be packed into the iPhone 8 when it hits the market, and just how many particular variants there are for this smartphone. Cupertino would need to make a big show out of it though -- and not a big mess, taking into consideration how 2017 is going to be the 10th year that the iPhone line has been in existence. This milestone will be celebrated through the release of the iPhone 8, and a fair number of rumors have been surrounding this device for the past few months.

While Apple has never been shy to price their products on the high end side of things, so much so that there is the cult personality that has gone around, citing that anyone who is able to afford an Apple product is doing pretty all right economically. Well, part of the reason that Apple is able to get away with this is because they pack in some of the newer technology with each iteration of their devices and products, which means having to fork out more money in the first place in order to be an early adopter. As for the fabled $1,000 iPhone 8, will that be a reality when it finally hits the market?

A suitable answer would be, “Why not?” After all, the iPhone 8 is touted to be the first OLED iPhone that will arrive with a boatload of new technology. One can also expect the usual slew of campers lining up days, or even up to a week before it arrives at the store officially, in order to gain their 15 minutes of fame (and perhaps make a quick buck by selling the iPhone 8 to someone who simply does have the patience to wait in line). Apart from that, the limited availability of the iPhone 8 will also help spur demand and increase the price for it.

iPhone price history
Over in the US, we have seen the price of the iPhone increase steadily over the years, from its first generation up till the latest iPhone 7 Plus. Of course, a lot of this also has to do with the amount of internal storage space that is made available to the buyer. The unlocked iPhone 6 Plus carried a $949 price tag in the US with 128GB of internal memory, while the latest iPhone 7 Plus that sports double the amount of storage space at 256GB costs $969 Stateside.

This means it is all too easy for the iPhone 8 to break the psychological $1,000 barrier for a smartphone, which would clearly make it a posh device that many would love to have. Will we be able to see a 512GB iPhone 8 in the market? Only time will be able to tell, but OLED technology factored into the iPhone 8 would definitely make it all too easy to push beyond the $1,000 asking price in the US for an unlocked device. We will simply need to wait for a Q3 2017 announcement for the iPhone 8 to become reality.