Your Next Laptop Just Got More Expensive Due to the Global RAM Squeeze

You were going to buy a new laptop this year. That’s a fine plan. Unfortunately, the global semiconductor industry has a different timeline in mind, and it involves your wallet.

Welcome to RAMageddon. Yes, that’s a real thing people are calling it, and no, it’s not being overstated.

What’s Actually Happening

Unlike the 2020–2023 global chip shortage, which stemmed primarily from pandemic-related supply chain disruptions, this shortage is driven by a structural reallocation of manufacturing capacity toward high-margin products for artificial intelligence infrastructure, creating scarcity in both consumer and enterprise PC markets.

In plain English: the three companies that make nearly all of the world’s RAM decided AI data centers pay better, and the rest of us are now living with the consequences.

Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron, the three biggest RAM manufacturers in the world, comprising up to 93% of the market, have accelerated production of high-bandwidth, high-capacity memory to supply AI data centers. 

The math here is brutal. A single AI server can use as much advanced memory as dozens or even hundreds of traditional laptops. When hyperscalers like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon are building thousands of these servers at once, consumer RAM supply doesn’t stand a chance.

This is a zero-sum game: every wafer allocated to an HBM stack for an Nvidia GPU is a wafer denied to the LPDDR5X module in a mid-range laptop or the SSD of a consumer notebook.

The Numbers Are Not Gentle

Memory prices have already surged approximately 90% in the first quarter of 2026 compared to the fourth quarter of 2025. HP revealed in its Q1 2026 earnings call that memory costs now account for 35% of PC build materials, up from 15–18% the previous quarter.

Lenovo, Dell, HP, Acer, and ASUS have already warned of 15–20% price hikes across their lineups, and that may be the conservative estimate. Gartner projects that a 130% surge in combined DRAM and SSD prices by the end of 2026 will push PC prices up 17% compared to 2025 levels, and wipe out the sub-$500 laptop market entirely within two years.

Lenovo CFO Winston Cheng described the cost surge as “unprecedented.” When the world’s largest PC manufacturer uses that word, it’s worth paying attention.

The Sneaky Alternative: Shrinkflation

Here’s the part manufacturers won’t put in a press release. Rather than raise the sticker price outright, some OEMs are quietly downgrading the specs inside the box. Avril Wu, Senior Research Vice President at TrendForce, predicts that high-end models are more likely to see outright price increases, while mid- to low-end models will more often adopt “de-spec strategies” to maintain price points. 

That $699 laptop you’re eyeing? It might ship with 8GB of RAM instead of the 16GB you’d expect. Same chassis. Same price tag. Less machine.

This is particularly unfortunate timing, given the AI PC moment the industry is trying to capitalize on. Microsoft’s Copilot+ PCs require a minimum of 16GB of RAM, and just as the industry needs to add more memory, it has become prohibitively expensive to do so.

When Does It End?

Not soon. Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan has publicly acknowledged there will likely be “no relief until 2028.” “Memory shortages will persist well into 2027,” said Jitesh Ubrani, Research Manager at IDC. “While we anticipate some easing beginning in 2028, the market is unlikely to return to 2025 pricing levels. Instead, we expect a new normal defined by structurally higher prices.”

So, What Should You Do?

Supply chain expert Nada Sanders, Distinguished Professor at Northeastern University, puts it plainly: “I would be buying new devices now because they are just going to get more expensive, and they are going to continue getting more expensive until this problem is addressed.”

The RAM squeeze is real, it’s structural, and it’s rewriting the economics of consumer computing. If your current laptop still boots up without protest, consider treating it with a little more respect. It might be the last affordable one you own for a while.