Apple Music just got a lot more expensive in India

I had gotten pretty comfortable with Apple Music’s India pricing in recent times. I’ve been a long-time Spotify user, long before it launched in India (thanks, Ronak). However, I’d grown increasingly annoyed at them for pushing their podcasts into their music app, and their recommendation engine — something that had worked incredibly well for the longest time — had become terrible. But I still maintained an active Apple Music subscription, because it costed just ₹99 a month. So some time last year, I switched to Apple Music full-time and ditched the Spotify subscription I’ve held for so long. 

The Apple Music subscription was active long enough that I’d stopped noticing the monthly deduction altogether. That changed this week. Apple has raised Apple Music subscription prices in India by up to 28 percent, while leaving its Apple One bundle completely untouched (so far).

The new Apple Music India pricing in July 2026

  • Individual: ₹119 → ₹139/month (~17% hike)
  • Family: ₹179 → ₹229/month (~28% hike)
  • Student: ₹59 → ₹69/month (~17% hike)

The Family plan takes the biggest hit by far. For context, the US Individual plan only went up about 9 percent ($10.99 → $11.99), so India’s getting a noticeably steeper increase this time around — not the first time regional pricing hasn’t scaled 1:1 with the US, but a bigger gap than usual.

Apple hasn’t put out an India-specific statement, but the new prices are already live on Apple’s India pricing page. This is also the third time Apple has increased their pricing in the country in recent times, following the MacBook and Pro price hikes in June over rising memory costs, and the AppleCare+ price hikes earlier this week by roughly ₹3000.

As for the reasoning, Apple told Music Business Worldwide:

“As a result of rising licensing costs, Apple Music is increasing its subscription price beginning today.”

Same explanation Apple’s given before — more of the fee is supposed to flow through to artists and rights holders, not just Apple’s margins. Licensing costs genuinely have been climbing across the industry, to be fair, and Apple isn’t alone here: Spotify raised its own India and global pricing earlier this year too, and Apple’s marketing team happily took a jab at them for it on social media at the time.

Apple One in India hasn’t changed — and that’s the interesting bit

Globally, Apple did revise Apple One pricing too — the Family and Premier tiers went up in the US, though the base Individual tier there was left alone. In India, though, Apple One isn’t budging at all: it’s still ₹195/month for Individual and ₹365/month for Family, the same pricing the bundle has had since it launched here in 2020. Also worth remembering: India still doesn’t get the Premier tier at all — that’s stayed US/UK/Australia/Canada-only since launch.

Practically, that makes the bundle a noticeably better deal than it was a week ago. Apple Music Individual alone is now ₹139/month — just ₹56 short of the ₹195 Apple One Individual plan, which also gets you Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, and 50GB of iCloud+ storage on top. If you’re already paying for two or more of those separately, it’s worth doing that math this week.

I don’t know if Apple’s planning to eventually bring India’s Apple One pricing in line with this Music hike, or if it’s deliberately holding the line to keep the bundle looking like the smarter buy while everyone absorbs the standalone increase. Either way — if you’re an Apple Music subscriber in India who’s never bothered looking at Apple One, this is probably the week to.

But my gut says Apple One pricing in India is increasing too.

July 18, 2026 · + Permalink

Backblaze Raises Subscription Pricing of Personal Backup to $7 Per Month

Backblaze CEO Gleb Budman, writing on the company blog:

Over the last 14 years, we have worked diligently to keep our costs low and pass our savings on to customers. We’ve invested in deduplication, compression, and other technologies to continually optimize our storage platform and drive our costs down—savings which we pass on to our customers in the form of storing more data for the same price.

However, the average backup size stored by Computer Backup customers has spiked 15% over just the last two years. Additionally, not only have component prices not fallen at traditional rates, but recently electronic components that we rely on to provide our services have actually increased in price.

The combination of these two trends, along with our desire to continue investing in providing a great service, is driving the need to modestly increase our prices.

Backblaze is a phenomenally good backup service and I’ve been a happy customer for several years now, with two active backup licenses for my Macs. I joined when their pricing was $5/month and only recently, they had raised their pricing to $6/month. Even at $7, Backblaze offers exceptional value — you’re literally getting unlimited backup. And for a couple of bucks more, they’ll keep your files for a whole year! I wrote down why I like the service so much the last time they raised prices.

However, their raising prices are making it incredibly difficult to recommend the service to most of my friends. The problem with their subscription is their all-or-nothing approach and the lack of localized pricing. Many of my friends have a few hundred GBs of important data that they want to back up. The Backblaze subscription is priced at almost ₹550 per month. How do you convince someone, who already doesn’t take backups seriously, to opt into a backup strategy that costs 3 times their cellular service?

I wish Backblaze B2 was the answer, which is something the company itself recommends for small quantity backups. But a subscription where your monthly expenses can vary depending on how much data you upload/download is even more difficult to recommend to friends.

If you’re convinced, here’s my affiliate link that’ll give you month free when you sign up, and a month free to me when you start paying for it.

July 14, 2021 · + Permalink

Apple Updates its iPod touch with a Faster Processor and More Storage

Apple iPod touch 2019 Lineup

The iPod touch isn’t dead!

Just when you thought that the iPod touch was dead and forgotten, Apple swoops in with a surprising update to the little music player.

The 2019 iPod touch now features an A10 processor (the previous one had A8) and goes up to 256 GB of storage (up from 128). That’s it! That’s all there is to add to the “What’s New” section if one was to create it for the iPod touch 2019.

It still features a 4″ display with big ugly bezels on the front, it still boasts a boring 8MP camera from the yesteryears, and is even available in the same set of vibrant colors as it has always been. The A10 processor is as old as the iPhone 7 series, but you do get the added benefit of Group FaceTime and ARKit support now.

I’m actually quite surprised Apple chose to update the little guy at all, but from what I’ve read so far, this makes for the perfect entry-level iOS device for kids and retail, especially considering the upcoming launch of Apple Arcade at the end of this year.

iPod touch 2019 India Pricing

The iPod touch 2019 pricing in India is as follows:

  • 32 GB Model – ₹18,900/-
  • 128 GB Model – ₹28,900/-
  • 256 GB Model – ₹38,900/-

I’m not sure this makes for a great “entry-level iOS device for kids” in India though.

May 29, 2019 · + Permalink

Apple Updates MacBook with Latest Processors & New Rose Gold Option [with India Pricing]

new-macbook-lineup-2016

Apple has today announced that it has updated the MacBook lineup, bringing along faster processors, improved graphics performance, faster flash storage and one hour longer battery life. Today’s refresh also introduces a new “Rose Gold” color option, taking the lineup to four color variants.

“MacBook is the thinnest and lightest Mac we have ever made and it’s our vision for the future of the notebook,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Customers are going to love this update to MacBook, with the latest processors, faster graphics, faster flash storage, longer battery life and a beautiful rose gold finish.”

The new MacBook now features the latest sixth-generation dual-core Intel Core M processors that go up to 1.3 GHz, with Turbo Boost speeds up to 3.1 GHz. You also get faster 1866MHz onboard memory, Intel HD 515 Graphics that are up to 25 percent faster than previous generation as well as longer battery life that can take you up to 10 hours of usage.

Apple has also increased the pricing for MacBook in India. Previously, the 12″ MacBook was launched at ₹99,900, with the second model coming in at ₹1,19,900. The new lineup is priced at ₹1,06,900 and ₹1,29,900 respectively, which means India Pricing has gone up by ₹7000 for the base model and ₹10,000 for the top model.

Update April 19th, 2016 20:29: It should be noted that the price increase happened last year, not particularly with today’s announcement.

April 19, 2016 · + Permalink

Apple Watch Gets a Price Cut in India

Apple Watch New Bands

Alongside the announcement of iPhone SE and 9.7-inch iPad Pro at the Special Event held yesterday at the company’s Town Hall in Cupertino, Apple also announced a new Space Black Milanese Loop and a new range of Woven Nylon bands for Apple Watch. During the presentation, Tim Cook also announced that the Apple Watch pricing now starts at just $299. This price change only affects the Sport models, with the 38mm version now priced at $299 (previously $349) whereas the 42mm version is now priced at $349 (previously $399). Both versions get a price cut of $50 each, which is about INR 3350.

Thanks to this, the Apple Watch pricing in India has been reduced as well. The Apple Watch was officially launched in India back in November, with the price starting at Rs. 30,900 for the 38mm Sport version and Rs. 34,900 for the 42mm Sport version.

After yesterday’s price cut announcement, Apple has confirmed that the 38mm Apple Watch Sport is now priced at Rs. 25,900 in India, while the 42mm version is now priced at Rs. 29,900. That’s a reduction of Rs. 5000 ($75) on the previous MRP.

It’ll take a while for this new pricing to be reflected across Apple’s retail presence in the country. The pricing of the Steel models as well as Apple Watch Edition remains unchanged.

March 22, 2016 · + Permalink