The price of every iMac, adjusted for inflation

What do the iMac M3 and the original iMac that was first released 25 years ago have in common aside from the name? Their retail price. Both start at $1,299 for the base model without any upgrades. But once you account for inflation, the original iMac with its plastic shell and CRT display was almost twice as expensive as the latest M3.  

Apple has kept the retail price of the iMac fairly stable over time

In its 25 years on the market, Apple has introduced 10 substantial redesigns of the iMac but has generally avoided major changes to the retail price. The table below shows the nominal retail price of every iMac when it was first introduced. They have never raised the price above the $1,299 of the first iMac and never offered a model for less than $1,099.

Multi-year Models

While Apple releases a new iPhone every fall, they keep their iMac offerings on the market for longer. This means the inflation adjusted cost of any given iMac model declines over the course of its life span. If you bought a 24” Retina iMac in April, 2021, it would have effectively cost you $1,236 in September 2023 dollars. If you bought it the day it was announced, it would have been $1,422. Of course, the downside is that by April 2021, the technology was more than half a decade old. 

Methodology 

• We looked at the base U.S. retail price for each generation of iMacs from The Complete History of the iMac. 

• Inflation adjustments are made using the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator comparing August of each year to September 2023.