Galaxy S25 Ultra Costs More to Make, But Price Hasn’t Changed… Yet

A new report reveals that Samsung is paying extra to produce the latest Galaxy S-series phones. Despite this, we haven’t seen a price increase yet. Could this suggest that a hike is coming soon, possibly with the Galaxy S26 line? We don’t know yet. Let’s take a closer look at what the report says.

Galaxy S25 Ultra production costs more than predecessors

According to the folks at Counterpoint Research, the cost of parts—known as the Bill of Materials (BoM)—inside the phones has increased from the Galaxy S23 Ultra to the Galaxy S25 Ultra. However, despite rising costs, Samsung hasn’t raised the prices. The Galaxy S23 Ultra launched at $1,199, while both the Galaxy S24 Ultra and the new S25 Ultra started at $1,299 for the 256GB model.

The report points out that one of the main reasons for the higher cost is the Snapdragon 8 Elite inside the Galaxy S25 Ultra (review). Previous reports indicated that Samsung committed fully to the Snapdragon 8 Elite globally across the line due to low yield rates with its in-house Exynos chipset. Of course, the Snapdragon 8 Elite is what makes the Galaxy S25 Ultra stand out, but it comes at a higher cost. From the Galaxy S24 Ultra to the S25 Ultra, the processor’s cost increased by about 21%.

Memory prices have shifted as well. Although they dropped from the Galaxy S23 Ultra to the Galaxy S24 Ultra, they rose slightly for the Galaxy S25 Ultra. Samsung also switched from an aluminum middle frame to titanium in the Galaxy S24 Ultra to make the phone lighter and stronger. This change added around 32% to the frame cost at that time. However, as Samsung’s process for manufacturing titanium frames improved, the cost decreased by about 8% for the S25 Ultra.

And then there are areas where Samsung benefits

The display on the Galaxy S24 Ultra is more expensive than the S23 Ultra’s because it is brighter and features an anti-reflective coating, even though the curved glass was replaced by flat glass. The Galaxy S25 Ultra’s screen costs less than the S24 Ultra’s due to lower OLED panel prices.

Other parts like antennas and cameras have generally become cheaper. Even though the Galaxy S25 Ultra’s camera has better sensors, the overall camera cost dropped about 8%. The bottom line is that, according to the report, the Galaxy S25 Ultra takes 3.4% more to produce than its predecessor.

While 3.4% may seem like a small difference, it is significant. A popular tipster shared that total Galaxy S25 Ultra sales reached around 8.39 million units globally by the end of May. When you factor in manufacturing costs, this translates into a substantial impact on profit margins.