Every iPhone comes with a label that says it was designed in California.
The thin rectangle that governs the lives of many of us was born as a project in the United States.
But it has most likely come to life thousands of miles away in China: the country hardest hit by US President Donald Trump's tariffs, which are now 245 percent for some Chinese export goods.
Apple sells more than 220 million iPhones a year, and by most estimates, nine out of 10 are made in China.
From shiny screens to batteries, many of the components of Apple products that are assembled into iPhones, iPads, or MacBooks are made in China.
Most are shipped to the US, Apple's largest market.
Tramp is shortcut exempted smartphones, computers, and some other electronic devices from customs duties, but that relief was short-lived.
The US president, meanwhile, has indicated that he will impose more tariffs.
"No one will 'get away with it'," he wrote on social media. Trut social, while his administration is investigating "semiconductors and the entire supply chain of electronic products."
The global supply chain that Apple touted as an asset has become a weakness.
The US and China, the world's two largest economic powers, are interdependent, and Trump's incredible tariffs have turned that relationship upside down overnight.
They led to the inevitable question: who is more dependent of the two?
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How the straw of salvation became a threat
China has benefited enormously by becoming host to the assembly lines of one of the world's most valuable companies.
It was a calling card for the West for quality manufacturing, and along the way it encouraged local innovation.
Apple entered China in the 1990s to sell computers through third-party suppliers.
Around 1997, when it was on the verge of bankruptcy while struggling to keep up with rivals, Apple found a silver lining in China.
China's young economy was opening up to foreign companies to boost production and create more jobs.
Apple officially arrived in China in 2001 through a trading company in Shanghai and began making products in the country.
He partnered with Foxconn, a Taiwanese electronics manufacturer operating in China, to make iPods, then iMacs, and finally iPhones.
As Beijing began to trade more and more with the world, aided by America no less, Apple increased its presence in the "factory of the world," as it was called.
China was not prepared to make iPhones at that time.
But Apple has handpicked a contingent of suppliers and helped them grow into “manufacturing superstars,” says Lin Sueping, a supply chain expert.
As an example, he cites Beijing Jingdiao, now a leading manufacturer of high-speed precision machines, which are used to efficiently make advanced components.
The company, which once cut acrylic, wasn't considered a machine tool maker, but eventually built glass-cutting machines and became "the star of Apple's mobile phone surface processing," says Lin.
Apple opened its first store in the country in Beijing in 2008, a year when the city hosted the Olympics and China's relationship with the West was at an all-time high.
That soon grew to 50 stores, with customers lining up outside their doors.
As Apple's profit margin grew, so did its assembly lines in China, with Foxconn running the world's largest iPhone factory in Zhengzhou, now dubbed "iPhone City."
For rapidly developing China, Apple has become a symbol of advanced Western technology – simple, yet original and convenient.
Most of Apple's most prized iPhones are now manufactured by Foxconn.
The advanced chips that power them are made in Taiwan, by the world's largest chip manufacturer, TSMC.
Production also requires rare earth elements used in audio applications and cameras.
About 150 of Apple's top 187 suppliers in 2024 had factories in China, according to an analysis by Nekei Asia.
"There is no supply chain in the world that is as important to us as China," said Tim Cook, Apple CEO, in an interview in 2024.
The threat of tariffs: Fantasy or ambition?
During Trump's first term as president, Apple managed to avoid the tariffs that the US president then imposed on China.
But this time Trump singled out Apple as an example before lifting tariffs on some electronic products.
He believes that the threat of high tariffs will actually encourage companies to make products in America.
"An army of millions and millions of people turning tiny screws to make iPhones - that's what's coming to America," said Howard Latnick, the commerce secretary, in an interview in early April.
"President Trump has made it clear that America cannot rely on China to make key technologies like semiconductors, chips, smartphones and laptops," said Carolyn Leavitt, a White House spokeswoman.
"These companies are now, at the behest of the president, scrambling to move production to the US as quickly as possible," she added.
But many are skeptical.
The idea that Apple could move its assembly operation to the US is "pure fantasy," believes Eli Friedman, a former member of the company's academic advisory board.
He says the company has been considering diversifying its supply chain from China since 2013, when he first joined the board, but that the US was never an option.
Friedman adds that Apple didn't make much progress in the next decade, but that it "made a real effort" after the pandemic, when China's strict COVID-19 quarantines hurt production performance.
"The most important new assembly locations were in Vietnam and India, but most of Apple's assembly still takes place in China," he reminds.
Apple did not respond to BBC questions, but the company's website says its supply chain includes "thousands of companies in more than 50 countries."
Watch the clash between iPhone factory workers and police in China during the pandemic
Challenges Ahead
Any change to the current status quo of Apple's supply chain would be a huge blow to China, which is trying to restart production after the pandemic.
Many of the reasons why the country wanted to become a manufacturing hub for Western companies in the early 2000s are still valid today.
This creates hundreds of thousands of jobs and gives the country a key advantage in world trade.
"Apple has found itself at the epicenter of tensions between the US and China, and the tariffs reflect the costs of that exposure," said Jigar Dixit, a supply chain and operations consultant.
This could explain why China did not give in to Trump's threats, but rather responded to the impositions of 125 percent on American imports.
China has also imposed export controls on a wide range of key rare earth minerals and magnets that it has in huge stockpiles, dealing a blow to America.
But the US tariffs that will continue to apply to other Chinese sectors will do damage.
It's not just Beijing that's facing higher tariffs.
Trump has made it clear that he will take action against countries that are part of China's supply chain.
One of them is Vietnam, where Apple moved iPod production.
The country was facing 46 percent tariffs even before Trump imposed the 90-day pause, so moving production elsewhere in Asia is not an easy way out of this crisis.
"Every conceivable location for huge Foxconn assembly plants with tens or hundreds of thousands of workers is in Asia, and all of those countries are facing higher tariffs," Friedman says.
What will Apple do now?
The company is battling fierce competition from Chinese firms as the government pushes the production of advanced technology in a race with America.
Now that "Apple has developed China's ability to manufacture electronic devices, Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo and others can take advantage of its thinned supply chain," Lin says.
Apple lost its position as the largest smartphone vendor in China to Huawei Vivo in 2024.
The Chinese aren't spending enough due to a sluggish economy, and since ChatGPT is banned in China, Apple is having trouble maintaining its lead among buyers who want AI-powered phones.
It also offered rare discounts on iPhones in January to boost sales.
And while working under increasing pressure from Xi Jinping, the Chinese president, Apple has had to restrict the use of Bluetooth and AirDrop (a data transfer system) on its devices because the Chinese Communist Party wants to censor political messages shared by people.
He overcame the tech industry suffocation that affected Alibaba founder and multi-billionaire Jack Ma.
Apple has announced an investment of just over 500 billion euros in the US, but it may not be enough to appease the Trump administration in the long run.
Given the several sudden turns and uncertainty surrounding Trump's tariffs, more unforeseen levies are expected.
They could again reduce the company's room for maneuver and leave it with even less time at its disposal.
Dixit says that smartphone tariffs won't hurt Apple if they resurface, but they will certainly put some "pressure - both operational and political" on the supply chain that won't be able to be alleviated quickly.
"Obviously the severity of the immediate crisis has diminished," Friedman says, referring to the smartphone exemption.
"But I really don't think that means Apple can relax."
Additional reporting by Fan Wang
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