Thanks to the AI boom devouring the majority of the world's memory and storage supply, end-consumers are now facing increasingly inflated prices for common components. DDR5 RAM, a necessity for building current-gen Intel or AMD systems, has now reached record highs in terms of pricing; a 64 GB kit of G.Skill's Trident Z5 Neo 6000 MT/s RAM is listed at $599.99 on Newegg right now — that's $200 more than a PS5 Slim or a Microsoft Xbox Series S, and just $50 shy off an entire PS5 Pro at the moment.
A quick glance at price tracking data, and G.Skill's Trident Z5 Neo kit has regularly sat at $205-$220 for the past few months, and it was only in late October that it started to pick up steam. From September 20th when it was listed at $220, to $640 now. In just 2 months we've witnessed an astounding ~190% surge.
Right as this particular Trident Z5 Neo kit began to skyrocket in price was when the industry first started to pick up on the affects of the AI crunch. A few days later we published our initial coverage on DDR5 RAM price hikes; from there, the situation has only worsened to reach worrying levels.
Insane mark-up aside, the kit itself is one of the best on the market, recommend as the top pick for DDR5 memory in our roundup. Unfortunately, it seems like high prices are going to be the story going forward. The surge in demand for AI projects will see production lines will prioritizing serving AI clients, leaving consumers to pay through the nose or make the best of what they have. Experts speculate that both DRAM and NAND constraints will become normal throughout 2026 as Big Tech looks to pursue AGI.
In the meantime, hard drives are vanishing from store shelves to the point where microSD cards are serving as a feasible replacement for them. Large-capacity nearline HDDs are backordered for 2 years, as a result of which QLC SSDs are now being swept up at alarming rates. Many distributors are even selling memory and motherboards bundled together to combat the global shortage.
Even Valve's upcoming Steam Machine will end up costing more than expected due to the production window of the device aligning with the DRAM crisis. That being said, memory has almost always lived in a rollercoaster cycle, with manufacturers oversupplying for a couple of years, then undersupplying for the next few. Looking at it optimistically, you're probably going to find DDR5 at bargain prices again in 2027.
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