iPhones remain Apple’s best-selling products by significant margins. Every year when the new iPhones are rolled out, people rush to buy them every single time. Be it the interface, design, operating system or just comfort/loyalty in using, the reasons are many for iPhone buyers. However, if you are in Australia, it isn’t the best and cheapest option to grab your new iPhone.

The CommSec iPhone index comes amidst Apple announcing a variety of new products and services including the new Apple Watch and iPad Air. According to the index, Australia is listed as the 18th cheapest place to snag an iPhone, compared to being the fourth one in 2019. It has dropped down on the list of cheapest places to buy an iPhone 11. The reason why Australia fell from being one of the cheapest places to buy an iPhone is because of the firm Australian dollar which was boosted by the high iron ore prices. In 2019, Australia was listed as the fourth cheapest place to snag an iPhone, and the third cheapest place to buy an iPad.

In 2019, the Australian dollar stood near US 68-69 cents and today it is closer to 72 cents. The Australian dollar has appreciated by almost 6 percent against the price of the US dollar last year. This means that Australia has slipped down the global leader market of US dollar pricing of the latest Apple devices. If the dollar hadn’t appreciated, Australia would have been the eighth cheapest place to grab your iPhone. In fact, Latin America and Eastern Europe pay the highest in the world for both iPhones and iPads. At the top of the list of countries paying the most for an iPhone 11 are Argentina, Vietnam and the Czech Republic.

The CommSec iPhone Index has been buzzing around since 2007 offering users to see how currency changes affect the user spending and globalization. It also provides a new way to see the purchasing power theory, which suggests the idea of selling a commodity at the same price around the world when you take exchange rates into account. But this comes with its own set of challenges in terms of shipping costs, etc. The varying tax rates also make it difficult to compare prices between different countries, for instance, Australia includes the GST in the Apple Store price. The sales tax environments aren’t as clear on the pricing of iPads and iPhones in many other countries. One of the Australian experts said, “We are a massive island in the middle of nowhere, they can charge us whatever and we will have to pay for it”.