'Made in USA' phones are a myth?

The infrastructure, labor, and supply chains simply don’t exist in the U.S., making Trump’s threat to impose a 25% tariff on non-U.S.-made smartphones absurd.

On the evening of May 23, President Donald Trump posted on social media that Apple will have to pay a tax of at least 25% on iPhone models manufactured outside the United States.

According to Mr. Trump, not only Apple, the new tax affects all other manufacturers importing into the US to ensure fairness. The head of the White House said the 25% tax is expected to take effect at the end of June.

The problem here is that what President Trump wants seems impossible. Apple, Samsung, Google, and all the other smartphone makers simply can't make phones in the United States.

"That's about as impossible as jumping into a toy plane to fly to Congo in 17 minutes," Android Authority likened.

Impossible

According to Android Authority , any manufacturer would face three nearly insurmountable problems when manufacturing phones in the US.

The first and most important problem is infrastructure. The factories needed to make every aspect of a smartphone, including the display, silicon chips, batteries, and camera sensors, simply don’t exist in the US.

For any company to start trying to manufacture phones here, they would need to spend billions, or possibly even trillions of dollars just to create the necessary infrastructure, and it would take at least 10 years to complete.

Once the infrastructure is in place, these companies will need highly skilled people to run the plants. The United States does not currently have any such people, so they will need to be found and trained. This is also a very expensive process that will take years to complete.

Apple and other smartphone companies currently do not have any factories in the US to produce phones. Photo: CNBC.

Even if they tried to sidestep this issue by bringing in people from other countries with experience, those workers would need to be paid enough to live in the U.S. Moreover, these professionals would still be counted as immigrants, and Mr. Trump has taken a very hard line on illegal immigration.

Even if a company somehow overcomes these two problems, the lack of materials will still be a major constraint. Some rare earth metals needed to make smartphone components are not widely available in the United States.

An example is Scandium (Sc), which is used in battery alloys. The last time the US produced Sc was 50 years ago.

“Even if by some miracle you found all the rare earth minerals needed for a phone in the US, you would still need to build refineries to process those minerals. Of course, companies would need to hire workers to do this,” Android Authority notes.

Other solutions

In recent years, the US corporation has also moved part of its iPhone production from China to India, which has lower tariffs. But Mr. Trump has publicly called on CEO Tim Cook to bring all production back to the US.

This shows the White House chief's tough stance on an "all or nothing" solution.

However, Android Authority suggests that Trump is just trying to be tough and could potentially accept a smartphone that is “primarily” made in the US. This is entirely possible, but it would certainly increase the cost of a phone exponentially.

China is very good at manufacturing smartphone components and can do it at a much lower cost than other countries.

Shifting component manufacturing to the US would raise costs to alarming levels. By some estimates, a fully American-made iPhone could cost as much as $3,500 .

Android Authority believes the only way to see it is for companies to absorb the damage from tariffs is to increase prices by 25% to offset increased production costs. Photo: Bloomberg.

Android Authority notes that the only way to see it is for companies to suffer from tariffs. Apple, Samsung, and all other manufacturers planning to sell phones in the US will need to consider a 25% price increase to offset the increased manufacturing costs.

Of course, this means consumers will have to pay more for a phone than they did before. The iPhone 16 and Galaxy S25, for example, both start at $799 , and a 25% increase would push them to $999 . That's a significant change.

A common strategy to save money on a phone is to buy an older model. However, if the iPhone 17 comes out with a significantly higher price tag, demand for older iPhone models could increase, pushing up their prices as well.

On the other hand, if you own an old iPhone, the price of this device can also increase in the used market.

Source: https://znews.vn/dien-thoai-made-in-usa-la-chuyen-hoang-duong-post1555829.html