Where to buy a phone outright in Australia: which store is cheapest?
Mobileciti, Costco, Harvey Norman, JB Hi-Fi, The Good Guys or straight from Apple and Samsung? Who has the lowest outright price on the same phone most often, updated every morning.
In this guide
Buying a phone outright is usually the cheapest way to own one, as long as you buy it from the right store. The same iPhone or Galaxy, with the same storage, can be a couple of hundred dollars apart between Australian retailers on the same day.
We check 212 phones at 391 Australian stores and carriers every morning, by exact model and storage. Here's who has the lowest outright price most often.
Which store is cheapest for phones
| Store | Prices compared | Cheapest (or equal cheapest) | Typical gap when not |
|---|---|---|---|
| Costco | 18 | 83% | +12% |
| Mobileciti | 46 | 65% | +25% |
| Harvey Norman | 60 | 52% | +8% |
| Mwave | 12 | 50% | +12% |
| The Good Guys | 75 | 39% | +6% |
| digiDirect | 50 | 38% | +6% |
| JB Hi-Fi | 85 | 31% | +5% |
| MSY / Umart | 20 | 20% | +4% |
| Samsung Store | 13 | 15% | +13% |
| amaysim | 33 | 15% | +12% |
| Betta | 24 | 0% | +13% |
| Apple Store | 20 | 0% | +3% |
Every product variant at least two of these stores had in stock today, at its outright price. Recalculated every morning.
Carrier device repayments aren't counted here; this is outright prices only. When we wrote this (October 2026), Costco and Mobileciti had the lowest price most often on the phones they sell, with Harvey Norman and digiDirect close behind. Apple's own store was rarely the cheapest place to buy an iPhone.
The most compared phones today
- 1
Samsung Galaxy A1714 stores · cheapest at digiDirectfrom$297 - 2
Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra13 stores · cheapest at Costcofrom$2,099.99 - 3
Apple iPhone 17 Pro13 stores · cheapest at JB Hi-Fifrom$1,699 - 4
Apple iPhone 17 Pro Max13 stores · cheapest at JB Hi-Fifrom$1,879 - 5
Samsung Galaxy A3712 stores · cheapest at MSYfrom$529 - 6
Samsung Galaxy S2612 stores · cheapest at Harvey Normanfrom$1,147 - 7
Apple iPhone 18 Pro Max12 stores · cheapest at Costcofrom$2,249.98 - 8
Apple iPhone Air12 stores · cheapest at Costcofrom$1,739.99 - 9
Apple iPhone 18 Pro11 stores · cheapest at Costcofrom$2,049.99 - 10
Apple iPhone 1611 stores · cheapest at MSYfrom$1,299
Store by store
- Mobileciti is a phone specialist with a big range and sharp prices.
- Costco often undercuts everyone on the few phones it stocks, but you need a membership, and the range is narrow.
- JB Hi-Fi, Harvey Norman and The Good Guys stock almost every phone and run frequent promotions; they're good for price matching.
- Apple and Samsung sell at RRP most of the time. Their value is trade-in offers, configurations or colours others don't stock, and launch-day availability.
- Carriers (Telstra, Optus, Vodafone) sell outright too, but their strength is plans. See outright vs plan.
Watch out for
- Grey imports. Marketplace sellers can be cheaper because they sell overseas stock, which may miss Australian network bands or the local warranty. More here. We leave them out.
- Storage confusion. A price can be the base storage while the picture shows the bigger model. Our prices are always per storage size.
- Carrier-locked phones. We leave those out too.
Choose your phone
Start with the best phones in Australia, the best phones under $500 or where to buy the cheapest iPhone. Every phone and every store's price is on the phones page.
