Question Is the cost of RAM going up everywhere?

[bba-tcg]

It's a blank page for me. Says 0 compatible products for your link.

Says 2977 Compatible Products here w/ Firefox.

 

[bba-tcg]

I paid $280 for the first one listed here: https://pcpartpicker.com/products/memory/#sort=price&ff=ddr5&m=12&Z=131072002 in May.

 

[dlerious]

FF w/noscript set to allow works for me. Try safe mode?

It's working now. Don't know what happened, I have cats that walk across the keyboard when they want attention. I've seen the browser do crazy shit before while I'm trying to get them away.

 

[Golgatha]

I've seen several discussion lately of people finding select kits of 96GB or 128GB for lower prices that haven't been updated. For people with that kind of money and fearful of the next couple of years, it might be worth looking through various retailers listings.

I've also seen better $/GB ratio on 48GB kits versus 32GB kits, and that's your highest capacity with the lowest memory controller load too. Win-Win. Back when I got my 64GB kit, they were just about at price parity with the 48GB kits. Oh my how things have changed.

Edit: I paid $165.99 and the same 64GB kit is now $624.99 (11/25, on sale), and it was $428 on 11/10. WTF!!!

 

[manly]

About 12 months ago, I bought Kingston Fury 8GB DDR4-3200 modules for £15 (UKP) a pop. Now it translates through to £33 (the 8GB module isn't available on its own from my normal supplier, so I divided the price of the 16GB pack by 2).

I've checked around other UK suppliers and there definitely seems to be a trend. There's talk about the demand for AI driving up prices of NAND (which I'm seeing too, just not as drastic), but I would have thought that DDR4 memory chips wouldn't have been affected by that. I checked DDR5 prices this morning in the hope that the rising DDR4 prices were a sign that it was time to move my baseline PC builds onto DDR5 tech, but no, they're higher still.

It's been a little over a month since you posted, and market conditions are deteriorating rapidly lol.

The "good" news is DDR4 for baseline builds is still in play. Apparently DDR5 has tripled in retail price these past few months. Thankfully I don't need to buy RAM today, because the prices are UGLY.*

As for the largest PC OEMs, they don't pay spot pricing on DRAM. They don't necessarily have to stockpile a years worth of inventory, as they negotiate long-term contracts with component suppliers.

* Ars has some coverage:

GPU prices are coming to earth just as RAM costs shoot into the stratosphere

Some RAM kits are over three times as expensive as they were three months ago.

arstechnica.com

 

[mikeymikec]

The memory module I was using as a reference in the OP is now selling for £75 for 8GB (£150 for 2x8GB).

 

[Hulk]

I read that elsewhere too.

But I wonder if it really can explain all of it. I mean the amount of HBM memory needed for AI should still be far less than the amount of DRAM for laptops/mobile/PCs/etc, right?

Just mobile phones alone sell ~1.5B units per year, and they have ~8 GB RAM each. How many GPUs are sold per year for AI?

The demand for wafers in general is at an all time high so any additional pressure from a silicon market segment creates a dent that depletes supply and drives us prices. It's a short term bubble. Memory production will increase to make some quick profit on the momentary spike in memory prices and some other segment will be in short supply. It's a world of wafer demand right now until additional fabs come online and/or Intel gets their fabs going with competitive nodes in a meaningful way.

If I had any DDR5 around I wasn't using I'd sell it for a quick profit.

 

[EXCellR8]

If I had any DDR5 around I wasn't using I'd sell it for a quick profit.

This. I had a 7200 MT/s kit that turned out to be incompatible with a recent rebuild; was able to pawn it off pretty quickly.

 

[Makaveli]

So happy I bought my 64GB kit in march/april of this year.

Cost me $300 CAD and now as of today same kit is $935.

I had people telling me wait for black friday sales which would have screwed me over glad I went with my gut.

 

[EXCellR8]

Yep, that's back when I didn't want to build anything new... DDR5 was very cheap. Decided to rebuild one of my Intel desktops more recently... CPU and mobo were dirt cheap on Newegg, but then I had to spend around that much ($270) for half that capacity. There was no way I was paying upwards of $300 or $400 for 32GB tho... which would have meant my nicely rebuilt tower would simply be a desk dust collector for who knows how long...

Ryzen refresh is def off the table for the time being. L market.

 

[Golgatha]

Yep, that's back when I didn't want to build anything new... DDR5 was very cheap. Decided to rebuild one of my Intel desktops more recently... CPU and mobo were dirt cheap on Newegg, but then I had to spend around that much ($270) for half that capacity. There was no way I was paying upwards of $300 or $400 for 32GB tho... which would have meant my nicely rebuilt tower would simply be a desk dust collector for who knows how long...

Ryzen refresh is def off the table for the time being. L market.

For sure. I'll stick with my 9800X3D if I have to buy 8000MT memory at these extortionate prices to get an optimal Zen 6 experience.

 

[EXCellR8]

Really wanted to build something w Granite Ridge this year but just had too many other expenses. I'm still scraping by on a Zen 3 system. I tend to stay on platforms for a long time anyway, but ngl even this is a stretch at this point.

 

[Fjodor2001]

Now starting to affect sales of other electronics too:

Soaring RAM Prices Have Reportedly Halved Motherboard Sales; Are CPUs Next?

As per a report, due to sky-high DRAM prices, particularly DDR5, the motherboard sales have almost halved in November.

wccftech.com

 

[Makaveli]

Now starting to affect sales of other electronics too:

Soaring RAM Prices Have Reportedly Halved Motherboard Sales; Are CPUs Next?

As per a report, due to sky-high DRAM prices, particularly DDR5, the motherboard sales have almost halved in November.

wccftech.com

yes cost of everything is going up.

If you had an upgrade planned and didn't do it before Mid sept you are 90% screwed.

 

[mikeymikec]

Apparently all because one CEO wanted to stay in the lead at any cost.

 

[Fjodor2001]

yes cost of everything is going up.

If you mean the total cost of electronics devices containing substantial amount of RAM, then yes. But the increasing RAM price does not affect the price of other separate electronic parts (e.g. motherboards, CPUs, etc).

However the increasing RAM prices not only affects cost, but from the article I linked to also sales volume of other electronics.

E.g. motherboard sales cut in half compared to same period last year. I assume because people are postponing their computer purchases due to RAM prices driving up the total cost of the new computer too much currently.

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Goddamn AI bubble, and damn Sam Altman to hell! That guy is screwing up the entire world with his idiotic pursuits. Wherever you go these days, you can't move in any direction without some friggin' AI snake oil coming your way. It's already gotten so bad that you can't trust any video, image or audio posted on the internet.

I can't wait to watch them burn when it all collapses like the dot-com in 2000.

Make no mistake, the industry loves this. The PC was the last bastion of consumer choice: being able to build your machine according to whatever needs, budget or fancy was a degree of freedom without precedent.

And now they're taking this from us, as well.

 

[Makaveli]

Goddamn AI bubble, and damn Sam Altman to hell! That guy is screwing up the entire world with his idiotic pursuits. Wherever you go these days, you can't move in any direction without some friggin' AI snake oil coming your way. It's already gotten so bad that you can't trust any video, image or audio posted on the internet.

I can't wait to watch them burn when it all collapses like the dot-com in 2000.

Make no mistake, the industry loves this. The PC was the last bastion of consumer choice: being able to build your machine according to whatever needs, budget or fancy was a degree of freedom without precedent.

And now they're taking this from us, as well.

Nah this will go back to normal after awhile until the next big thing.

Nothing changes on the 3rd rock from the sun.

 

[dlerious]

Goddamn AI bubble, and damn Sam Altman to hell! That guy is screwing up the entire world with his idiotic pursuits. Wherever you go these days, you can't move in any direction without some friggin' AI snake oil coming your way. It's already gotten so bad that you can't trust any video, image or audio posted on the internet.

I can't wait to watch them burn when it all collapses like the dot-com in 2000.

Make no mistake, the industry loves this. The PC was the last bastion of consumer choice: being able to build your machine according to whatever needs, budget or fancy was a degree of freedom without precedent.

And now they're taking this from us, as well.

It's not just PCs they're screwing. They use electricity and water in large amounts, but somehow they're getting consumers to foot the bill for that as well.

 

[fastandfurious6]

yeah I predict spiked prices all across the board

this is directly relevant to how 5-3nm+ computing has become too efficient / too fast / too cheap and there's less and less justification to buy newer gens especially when it comes to desktops

while top-end has extreme demand i.e. datacenters, AI inference...

basically zen 3/4/5 gens will retain prices (and even increase) while every newer gens will have x2 price markup

and for the economically very weak market segments needs can be sated with older recycled zen 2 machines

this is already predicted here https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/the-death-of-the-desktop-cpu.2628930/ if it wasn't considered a "troll thread" lol

 

[fastandfurious6]

when a $1500 laptop retains 80% of top-end desktop power while being mobile and running cold/quiet enough, it's a huge market indicator that computing is becoming too fast/efficient and radical measures will be employed one way or another

 

[DrMrLordX]

this is already predicted here https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/the-death-of-the-desktop-cpu.2628930/ if it wasn't considered a "troll thread" lol

That's a stretch.

 

[Golgatha]

It's not just PCs they're screwing. They use electricity and water in large amounts, but somehow they're getting consumers to foot the bill for that as well.

They already have in Missouri with regard to electricity. They (moved from MO about 3 years ago) have higher costs overall and higher billing from 4-8pm I believe now. This is largely due to the increased infrastructure build out needed for a couple of datacenters that have been installed over the last couple of years. It's insane we let these billionaire goons do this, but literally everyone in Missouri is supplementing their ambitions because reasons I guess.

 

[dullard]

If you mean the total cost of electronics devices containing substantial amount of RAM, then yes. But the increasing RAM price does not affect the price of other separate electronic parts (e.g. motherboards, CPUs, etc).

You are correct that increasing RAM price does not directly affect the price of most other electronic parts. However, the cause of increased RAM prices (supply shortages and shifted demand to AI / Data centers) DOES affect the price of most other electronic parts.

AMD raising GPU prices: https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-reportedly-raising-radeon-8-gb-16-gb-graphics-card-prices-by-20-40

AMD raising CPU prices: https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-rumored-to-raise-ryzen-9000-and-older-cpu-prices-tonight

Intel raising CPU prices: https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-com...rice-hike-due-to-disinterest-in-ai-processors

NVidia raising GPU prices: https://wccftech.com/nvidia-amd-increase-gpu-prices-in-2026-rising-dram-costs/

SSDs going to go up in price: https://www.pcgamer.com/hardware/ss...-way-more-too-and-its-all-downhill-from-here/

TSMC raising prices: https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20251103PD204/tsmc-2026-manufacturing-price-increase-production.html due to AI demand: https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...vanced-node-capacity-falls-short-of-ai-demand

 

[Makaveli]

You are correct that increasing RAM price does not directly affect the price of most other electronic parts. However, the cause of increased RAM prices (supply shortages and shifted demand to AI / Data centers) DOES affect the price of most other electronic parts.

AMD raising GPU prices: https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-reportedly-raising-radeon-8-gb-16-gb-graphics-card-prices-by-20-40

AMD raising CPU prices: https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-rumored-to-raise-ryzen-9000-and-older-cpu-prices-tonight

Intel raising CPU prices: https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-com...rice-hike-due-to-disinterest-in-ai-processors

NVidia raising GPU prices: https://wccftech.com/nvidia-amd-increase-gpu-prices-in-2026-rising-dram-costs/

SSDs going to go up in price: https://www.pcgamer.com/hardware/ss...-way-more-too-and-its-all-downhill-from-here/

TSMC raising prices: https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20251103PD204/tsmc-2026-manufacturing-price-increase-production.html due to AI demand: https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...vanced-node-capacity-falls-short-of-ai-demand

Yup if you were planning an upgrade to a DDR5 rig this year and didn't do it before mid sept because you were waiting for Black Friday sales you got screwed.