Apple Price Check: August 2026
This month's snapshot covers the full TheresMac catalog, not just Macs: 170 tracked Apple products, of which 126 are current new models. For each one we compare the lowest in-stock new price at a tracked non-Amazon retailer to Apple's current list price.
Updated August 24, 2026. This edition first published on August 19 against a board where no price had been checked since July. 17 products have since been re-verified, between August 20 and 24, and they changed the story enough to be worth rewriting rather than leaving alone. The revised figures are below, and the section on what the re-check found is new.
The August headline
103 of the 123 new Apple products with an eligible in-stock price are available below Apple's current list price, averaging 5.8% below list. The largest single saving is $500, on the MacBook Pro 14" M5 Max at Best Buy.
That average is the honest but slightly flattering number, because most of the board has not been checked this month. Of the 123 prices behind it, only 17 were verified in August. The rest date to July (75) or June (31). Where we have looked recently, the picture is sharper and more mixed than the catalog-wide average suggests.
Compared with the July Mac Deal Report (100 of 118 products below list), the deep Mac and iPad Air discounts that defined early July have thinned out. Note the two editions are not directly comparable: July's index included Amazon lows, and this edition excludes Amazon entirely (see methodology).
What the August re-check found
Every row here was verified between August 20 and August 24, 2026. This is the only part of the report that reflects the last week rather than the last two months, so it is the part to trust most.
| Product | Category | Apple list | Lowest now | Retailer | vs list | Checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Watch Series 11 42mm GPS | Apple Watch | $399 | $299 | Sam's Club | -25.1% | Aug 23 |
| AirPods Max (1st edition) USB-C | AirPods | $549 | $419 | Walmart | -23.7% | Aug 20 |
| AirPods Pro 3 | AirPods | $249 | $189.99 | Best Buy | -23.7% | Aug 20 |
| AirPods 4 | AirPods | $129 | $99 | Walmart | -23.3% | Aug 20 |
| Apple Watch Series 11 46mm GPS | Apple Watch | $429 | $329 | Walmart | -23.3% | Aug 23 |
| AirPods Max 2 USB-C | AirPods | $549 | $429 | Best Buy | -21.9% | Aug 20 |
| Apple Watch SE 3 40mm | Apple Watch | $249 | $219.99 | BJ's | -11.7% | Aug 24 |
| Apple Watch SE 3 40mm GPS+Cell | Apple Watch | $299 | $264.95 | Best Buy | -11.4% | Aug 24 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 3 49mm | Apple Watch | $799 | $749 | Best Buy | -6.3% | Aug 23 |
| iMac M4 256GB | Mac | $1,499 | $1,424 | B&H | -5% | Aug 21 |
| iMac M4 512GB 24GB RAM (4 ports) | Mac | $2,099 | $1,996 | Abt | -4.9% | Aug 21 |
| iMac M4 256GB (4 ports) | Mac | $1,699 | $1,659.99 | Costco | -2.3% | Aug 21 |
| iMac M4 512GB (4 ports) | Mac | $1,899 | $1,859.99 | Costco | -2.1% | Aug 21 |
| Mac mini M4 Pro | Mac | $1,599 | $1,569.99 | Costco | -1.8% | Aug 21 |
| Mac mini M4 Pro 48GB RAM | Mac | $2,199 | $2,199 | Apple | 0% | Aug 21 |
| Mac mini M4 512GB | Mac | $999 | $1,299 | Walmart | 30% | Aug 21 |
| Mac mini M4 256GB | Mac | $799 | $1,049 | Best Buy | 31.3% | Aug 21 |
Three things stand out. AirPods improved against the board this report carried on August 19. The AirPods Max 2 USB-C is $429 at Best Buy, down from $449; the first-edition Max is $419 at Walmart, down from $449; the AirPods Pro 3 is $189.99 at Best Buy, down from $199.99. The AirPods 4 held at $99. Measured against July 1 rather than August 19 the picture is more mixed: both Max models are genuinely below their July lows, while the AirPods Pro 3 is still above the $179 it reached in July.
Apple Watch holds the deepest live discount. The Series 11 42mm GPS at $299 is -25.1% off list, the biggest verified gap of anything we checked this month.
The iMac discounts collapsed. Costco carried the iMac lows through July and has since raised them roughly $100 per configuration. The four-port iMac M4 went from -8.2% off to -2.3% off, and the 512GB four-port from -7.3% to -2.1%, without any change in Apple's list price.
The entry Mac mini is a trap right now
Two rows in the table above sit above Apple's list price, and they are worth explaining rather than averaging away. The Mac mini M4 256GB shows $1,049 against a $799 list, and the 512GB shows $1,299 against $999. Neither is a price rise.
Checked on August 21, every authorized retailer that lists the base Mac mini at Apple's $799 and $999 prices was out of stock or backordered, Apple's own store included. The only authorized listings actually in stock were the higher ones. Because this report ranks the lowest in-stock price, a sold-out shelf at list surfaces as an above-list figure.
The practical advice is simply: do not pay it. Apple's list price has not moved, the $250 and $300 premiums are stock scarcity rather than the market, and a backordered Mac mini at $799 is a better buy than an in-stock one at $1,049. The Mac mini M4 Pro, by contrast, is in stock at $1,569.99 at Costco, slightly under its $1,599 list.
The 20 deepest Apple deals on the board
Lowest in-stock new price at a tracked non-Amazon retailer, as a percentage of Apple's current list price. Board as of August 24, 2026; individual check dates vary and are shown in the table below.
Where the deals are
Read the Checked column alongside the price. A July date means that was the last time we confirmed the figure, not that it is confirmed today.
| Product | Category | Apple list | Lowest now | Retailer | You save | Checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| iPad 11" A16 | iPad | $449 | $326.99 | Target | $122.01 (-27.2%) | Jul 27 |
| Apple Watch Series 11 42mm GPS | Apple Watch | $399 | $299 | Sam's Club | $100 (-25.1%) | Aug 23 |
| AirPods Max (1st edition) USB-C | AirPods | $549 | $419 | Walmart | $130 (-23.7%) | Aug 20 |
| AirPods Pro 3 | AirPods | $249 | $189.99 | Best Buy | $59.01 (-23.7%) | Aug 20 |
| AirPods 4 | AirPods | $129 | $99 | Walmart | $30 (-23.3%) | Aug 20 |
| Apple Pencil (2nd gen) | Accessory | $129 | $99 | Costco | $30 (-23.3%) | Jun 18 |
| Apple Watch Series 11 46mm GPS | Apple Watch | $429 | $329 | Walmart | $100 (-23.3%) | Aug 23 |
| AirPods Max 2 USB-C | AirPods | $549 | $429 | Best Buy | $120 (-21.9%) | Aug 20 |
| iPad Pro 11" M5 256GB | iPad | $1,199 | $949 | Sam's Club | $250 (-20.9%) | Jul 27 |
| Apple Watch Series 11 42mm GPS+Cell | Apple Watch | $499 | $399 | Best Buy | $100 (-20%) | Jul 13 |
| AirPods 4 with ANC | AirPods | $179 | $144.99 | Apple | $34.01 (-19%) | Jul 26 |
| Apple Watch Series 11 46mm GPS+Cell | Apple Watch | $529 | $429.99 | Target | $99.01 (-18.7%) | Jul 13 |
| HomePod (2nd gen) | Accessory | $349 | $289 | Sam's Club | $60 (-17.2%) | Jun 25 |
| iPad 11" A16 256gb | iPad | $549 | $456 | Micro Center | $93 (-16.9%) | Jul 28 |
| iPad Air 13" M4 512GB | iPad | $1,249 | $1,049 | B&H | $200 (-16%) | Jul 16 |
The iPad 11" A16 at $326.99 is the deepest figure on the board at -27.2% off, though that price was last confirmed on Jul 27 and several comparable iPad lows have since expired. The deepest discount we can vouch for this week is the Apple Watch Series 11 42mm GPS at $299, -25.1% off.
Movement since the July report
Month-over-month movement compares matching products from the July 1 snapshot to the August 24 board, restricted to the 87 products whose July low was already a non-Amazon retailer, so both ends of each comparison use the same rules. Where the "lowest" retailer changed, the move can mean the cheaper July listing sold out or stopped verifying, not that a store raised its own price; we say so below rather than booking it all as market movement.
Deeper than July
$3,299 at Best Buy, checked Jul 14
-5% to -8.3% (-3.3% pts), $120 more savings
$419 at Walmart, checked Aug 20
-21.9% to -23.7% (-1.8% pts), $10 more savings
Less discounted than July
Read the right-hand column carefully, because two different things are mixed into it. The Mac mini rows are the stock problem described above: Apple still lists both at $799 and $999, and nobody authorized has them at that price in stock. The iPad Air 11" M4 is the other pattern: it did not get $167 more expensive at one store, its $554.99 BJ's listing from July 1 is no longer on our verified board, and the cheapest price we can still verify is $722 at Walmart. The same applies to the MacBook Air 13" M5, whose $949 Costco low gave way to $1,199 at B&H. Whether those July listings sold out or simply stopped being verifiable from here, our data cannot distinguish. The practical takeaway is the same either way: the deep early-July Mac and iPad Air lows are not reliably there anymore.
Buyer takeaways
- Audio and wearables are where the real discounts are. Of the 17 products verified in the last week, the six deepest are all AirPods or Apple Watch, between -21.9% and -25.1% off. Every current AirPods model we track is below list.
- Back-to-school buyers should check the date on any iPad deal. The iPad figures on this board are July prices, and the July lows at Costco, BJ's and Sam's Club have measurably expired elsewhere in the catalog. The iPad 11" A16 at $326.99 is still the cheapest current iPad if it holds, but confirm it before counting on it.
- Do not buy the entry Mac mini this week. It is sold out at list nearly everywhere authorized, and the in-stock listings are 30% and 31.3% above Apple's price.
- Macs are the weakest category for discounts. Of the 35 Macs tracked, 26 are below list, but the average Mac gap is only 2.9%. The deepest Mac discount is 12.5% on the MacBook Neo A18 512GB (Touch ID) at Walmart, and the biggest dollar gap is $500 on the MacBook Pro 14" M5 Max.
- Best Buy and Walmart own the board. Between them they hold 67 of the 123 lowest verified prices; Apple itself is the cheapest verified option on 13 products.
Methodology & media use
Figures are a snapshot of the TheresMac tracker taken August 24, 2026. For each of the 126 current new products in the 170-product catalog, "lowest now" is the lowest in-stock new price among tracked non-Amazon retailers, compared against Apple's current list price; 123 products had at least one eligible in-stock price. Refurbished models and used-marketplace listings (eBay, Swappa, Back Market) are excluded, as in July. Amazon prices are additionally excluded from this edition: a static report cannot keep an Amazon price current, so where Amazon is cheapest we simply do not show it here, and the live product pages remain the place to check it. July's report did include Amazon lows, which is part of why its 15.1% average gap is deeper than this month's 5.8%.
Each price carries its own last-verified date, shown in the "Checked" column. Of the 123 prices behind this report, 17 were verified between August 20 and 24, 2026, 75 between July 1 and July 30, and 31 between June 16 and June 30. Treat every figure as the last verified price rather than a live quote, and confirm on the linked product page before buying. The first version of this report, published August 19, contained no August-verified prices at all; that is what this update corrects.
Four rows sit above Apple's list price and are flagged rather than folded into the takeaways. The two Mac mini rows are a stock artifact and are explained in full above. The other two, the cellular iPad Pro 11" M5 1TB and 512GB configurations, are more likely a stale list-price field in our catalog than a genuine above-list market, and both were last checked in July or June.
One coverage gap is worth stating plainly: no iPhone price in this report was verified in August. Every current iPhone row was last confirmed between June 16 and July 3, so this edition cannot speak to iPhone pricing in the run-up to Apple's September event, and we have not tried to.
For journalists: this monthly report is free to cite and the chart is free to reproduce with attribution to TheresMac and a link to this page. For a custom cut, the underlying per-SKU history, or commentary, contact the TheresMac editorial team via theresmac.com/contact.
Related: July Mac Deal Report · Apple Price Increase Report · When Do MacBooks Go on Sale?