Following the announcement of President Trump's tariffs on April 2, one of the biggest concerns among U.S. consumers has been the potential increase in the cost of products sold in the country.
Even before the tariffs go into effect — April 9 — Nintendo said it would delay the launch of the Switch 2 to assess its impact.
Analysts have been predicting that prices will jump — some of Apple's products will be hit by a 54% tariff, according to Bloomberg's Marc Gurman — but Samsung says its TV business won't be as badly hurt.
But, have companies already started increasing the cost of their products?
To find out, I went to Amazon to analyze the prices on some of the more popular products. Here's what I found.
Methodology
First, a note about my methods: To come up with a list of the 200 popular products, I turned to Camelcamelcamel, which tracks the prices of products on Amazon.
I went to CCC's Popular Products page, and copied the price information from the first 200 products that were listed there. The data was taken on April 7, two days before the tariffs are due to take effect.
I then imported all the information into a spreadsheet, and analyzed the results.
I will say that this isn't a perfect barometer, as products go on sale all the time, and prices can also be affected by the age of a product, as well as myriad other factors. But, looking at prices over a range of categories could show a general trend one way or another.
Overall results
If you want to buy something before the tariffs hit, now's the time. According to my data, prices for these 200 items are down an average of 7.6% over their normal prices.
The current average price for the items listed was $417.17, while the historical average price for all the products is $446.62.
What's gone up the most
The product on the list that's seen the biggest increase is the Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones; they're currently listed for $348 on Amazon, but their average price according to CamelCamelCamel is just $222.
Product | Current price | Average price | Price difference | % difference |
Sony WH-1000XM4 Wireless Headphones | $348.00 | $222.44 | $125.56 | 36.08% |
Winix 5500-2 Air Purifier | $205.49 | $153.14 | $52.35 | 25.48% |
Akira 35th Anniversary Box Set | $179.98 | $136.51 | $43.47 | 24.15% |
Dynapep Energy Time Released Energy Micro-shot | $11.96 | $9.22 | $2.74 | 22.91% |
H&R Block Tax Software Deluxe + State 2024 | $59.99 | $46.34 | $13.65 | 22.75% |
Garmin inReach Mini 2 | $399.99 | $311.23 | $88.76 | 22.19% |
DEWALT Mechanics Tools Kit and Socket Set | $84.99 | $67.42 | $17.57 | 20.67% |
Bose QuietComfort Bluetooth Headphones | $349.00 | $279.12 | $69.88 | 20.02% |
Lavazza Super Crema Whole Bean Coffee | $131.75 | $108.16 | $23.59 | 17.91% |
Sony's headphones feel like a bit of an outlier, as it's a generation old, so its higher price may be more reflective of limited inventory.
The other device that saw the greatest increase, percentage-wise is the Winix 5500-2 Air purifier; while it's currently listed at $205 at Amazon (and a presuming 18% off its regular price), CamelCamelCamel says that its average price is just $153.14.
What about Apple products?
One company thought to be especially vulnerable to the tariffs is Apple, as a number of its most popular products are made in China, which could face tariffs of up to 54%.
However, it doesn't look like the company has adjusted its prices yet, so now may be the time to buy. In the list I compiled, there were a number of Apple products — the Apple Watch 10, AirPods Pro 2, iPad mini, MacBook Air, to name a few — and on average, prices were down 1.4%.
The product with the highest price increase is the Apple Watch Series 10 (42mm, GPS), which is now listed at $399, up from an average of $364. However, this could be more of a reflection that the watch isn't currently on sale — $399 is its regular price — than due to any international trade issues.
On the other end of the spectrum, the Apple iPad (10th Generation) with 256GB of storage is currently $349 on Amazon, down 27% from its average price of $446.
Outlook
There's no doubt that tariffs will soon impact the cost of consumer goods, as the tariffs will go into effect on April 9. Acer, for example, said that it will increase the cost of its products by 10%. And, there's still a remote chance that the U.S. will change the tariff rates on certain countries, depending on how much the Trump administration is willing to negotiate.
We'll be tracking the tariff increases here, so be sure to check in regularly to see if the goods you purchase will go up in price.
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