Buyers usually expect a phone to get cheaper as it ages. This autumn in Malaysia, Apple and Samsung went the other way on a large part of their line-ups. We lined up every iPhone, and every phone in Samsung's Galaxy S26, Galaxy Z Fold8 and Galaxy Z Flip8 families, that was on sale on the makers' own Malaysian online stores in the first week of September 2026 and is still on sale today, tier by tier, using the same model numbers on both dates. That gives 20 list prices. Eleven of them are higher today. Nine are unchanged. Not one is lower.
Contents
The full set, all 20 list prices:
| Phone | Storage | List price, 1 to 7 Sep 2026 | List price, 9 Nov 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| iPhone 16 | 128GB | RM3,499 | RM3,799 | +RM300 (+8.6%) |
| iPhone 17e | 256GB | RM2,999 | RM3,299 | +RM300 (+10.0%) |
| iPhone 17e | 512GB | RM3,999 | RM4,299 | +RM300 (+7.5%) |
| iPhone 17 | 256GB | RM3,999 | RM4,299 | +RM300 (+7.5%) |
| iPhone 17 | 512GB | RM4,999 | RM5,299 | +RM300 (+6.0%) |
| iPhone Air | 256GB | RM4,999 | RM5,299 | +RM300 (+6.0%) |
| iPhone Air | 512GB | RM5,999 | RM6,299 | +RM300 (+5.0%) |
| iPhone Air | 1TB | RM6,999 | RM8,299 | +RM1,300 (+18.6%) |
| Galaxy S26 | 256GB | RM4,399 | RM4,699 | +RM300 (+6.8%) |
| Galaxy S26 | 512GB | RM5,199 | RM5,499 | +RM300 (+5.8%) |
| Galaxy S26+ | 256GB | RM5,399 | RM5,399 | no change |
| Galaxy S26+ | 512GB | RM6,199 | RM6,199 | no change |
| Galaxy S26 Ultra | 256GB | RM5,999 | RM5,999 | no change |
| Galaxy S26 Ultra | 512GB | RM6,799 | RM6,799 | no change |
| Galaxy S26 Ultra | 1TB | RM7,999 | RM8,399 | +RM400 (+5.0%) |
| Galaxy Z Fold8 | 256GB | RM7,299 | RM7,299 | no change |
| Galaxy Z Fold8 | 512GB | RM8,099 | RM8,099 | no change |
| Galaxy Z Fold8 | 1TB | RM9,699 | RM9,699 | no change |
| Galaxy Z Flip8 | 256GB | RM5,399 | RM5,399 | no change |
| Galaxy Z Flip8 | 512GB | RM6,199 | RM6,199 | no change |
The stack, most surprising first
Every line below compares the same thing: the list price on the maker's own Malaysian store in an archived copy from 1 to 7 September 2026, against the same model number on the live store on 9 November 2026. List price means the price before any on-the-day promotion.
1. The 1TB iPhone Air went from RM6,999 to RM8,299, up RM1,300 (18.6%). It is the largest rise on any of the 20 price tags, more than four times the RM300 that most of the others moved.
2. The cheapest iPhone took the second-largest rise in percentage terms. The 256GB iPhone 17e went from RM2,999 to RM3,299, up 10.0%, behind only the 1TB iPhone Air. The same RM300 is a bigger share of a smaller price.
3. Last year's iPhone 16 now costs more than it did in early September. The 128GB iPhone 16 went from RM3,499 to RM3,799, up RM300 (8.6%). The iPhone 16 Plus and the 256GB iPhone 16 are no longer sold, so they are not counted.
4. The other five iPhone tiers each rose by RM300. The iPhone 17 went from RM3,999 to RM4,299 (256GB) and RM4,999 to RM5,299 (512GB). The 512GB iPhone 17e went from RM3,999 to RM4,299. The iPhone Air went from RM4,999 to RM5,299 (256GB) and RM5,999 to RM6,299 (512GB). That is all eight Apple tiers in the count, and all eight rose.
5. The Galaxy S26 went up RM300 at both storage sizes. The 256GB model went from RM4,399 to RM4,699 (6.8%) and the 512GB model from RM5,199 to RM5,499 (5.8%), both with 12GB of memory, the same as before.
6. The 1TB Galaxy S26 Ultra went from RM7,999 to RM8,399, up RM400 (5.0%). The 256GB and 512GB Ultra did not move, at RM5,999 and RM6,799.
7. Samsung left nine of its 12 tiers alone. The Galaxy S26+ (RM5,399 and RM6,199), the Galaxy Z Fold8 (RM7,299, RM8,099 and RM9,699), the Galaxy Z Flip8 (RM5,399 and RM6,199) and the two smaller Ultra tiers are at the same list price as in early September. So the split is sharp: Apple raised all eight tiers in our count, Samsung raised three of 12.
When the prices moved
The archived copies narrow down when each change landed. Apple's store still showed the iPhone 17 at RM3,999 in an archived copy from 1 September and already showed RM4,299 in one from 11 September (capture 20260911093906). We reported Apple's rises at the time in Apple Quietly Raised Older iPhone Prices in Malaysia, Up to RM1,300; this time we read every before-and-after figure from archived copies of Apple's own store and matched the model numbers ourselves.
Samsung's change came later. An archived copy of its Malaysian store from 20 September still shows the Galaxy S26 at RM4,399 and the 1TB Ultra at RM7,999. A copy from 19 October shows RM4,699 and RM8,399. So Samsung's rise landed somewhere in those four weeks. Neither maker's Malaysian store page cited a reason for the changes, and we are not reading a cause into them.
What the official figures show
For a wider view, we checked DOSM's consumer price index for mobile telephone equipment (subclass 08120), which tracks phone prices across the market rather than one maker's list price. It covers a different period from the store comparison above, so read it as related context, not as confirmation of it.
That index fell from 100.4 in September 2010 to 52.2 in January 2026, close to halving. Since January it has not fallen in any month, and it rose in four of the first nine months of 2026 (April, May, July and September), reaching 52.9 in September. No other year since 2010 had more than three rising months in January to September. It is still 0.4% below September 2025 (53.1), so on the official measure phone prices have stopped falling rather than clearly started rising. The index runs to September 2026, so it does not yet include October, when Samsung's change landed.
If you are buying now
Check the live price rather than the one you remember. On 9 November, Samsung's own Malaysian store showed an on-the-day price of RM4,399 for the 256GB Galaxy S26, RM300 under its new list price and the same as its list price in early September. Promotions change often, so that figure can move at any time and is not part of the comparison above. Our latest rebate round-up is Galaxy S26 Rebates in Malaysia.
The limits of this
These are list prices on the makers' own Malaysian online stores. Resellers, telcos and marketplaces can charge more or less. We counted only phones on sale on both dates, so the iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max and iPhone Duo (not on sale in early September), the Galaxy S26 FE (not in any early-September archived copy we could find) and anything Apple has since stopped selling are left out. On Samsung's side we covered the Galaxy S26, Z Fold8 and Z Flip8 families only, not its Galaxy A or other ranges. Each storage size counts as one price, so a model with three sizes contributes three lines. We compared Malaysian prices only and did not check other countries.
How to reproduce this
Open these Wayback Machine copies: web.archive.org/web/20260901180154/https://www.apple.com/my/shop/buy-iphone/iphone-16 (and the same capture time for iphone-17e, iphone-17 and iphone-air); web.archive.org/web/20260903131248/https://www.samsung.com/my/smartphones/galaxy-s26/buy/ (Galaxy S26 and S26+); web.archive.org/web/20260903131249/https://www.samsung.com/my/smartphones/galaxy-s26-ultra/buy/; web.archive.org/web/20260905131950/https://www.samsung.com/my/smartphones/galaxy-z-fold8/buy/; and web.archive.org/web/20260907024338/https://www.samsung.com/my/smartphones/galaxy-z-flip8/buy/. For timing, the Apple iPhone 17 capture of 20260911093906, and the Samsung captures of 20260920003800 and 20261019215000. Apple's page carries a full price for each part number; Samsung's carries a list price for each storage option with its model number and memory. Read the same part or model number on the live stores today and compare list against list. The DOSM index is subclass 08120 in the cpi_5d file at storage.dosm.gov.my/cpi/.
