The AI boom has led to a shortage of PC memory, as AI companies gobble up RAM and storage to power the thousands of servers in their growing number of data centers. This increased demand has resulted in a sharp spike in the price of RAM — the same RAM found in laptops and desktops — and computer manufacturers seem ready to pass this cost onto consumers.

What is happening to RAM prices in 2025?
RAM prices have climbed across every major category. DDR4, DDR5, LPDDR5 for mobile devices, and even server-class memory have all become more expensive. In many regions, consumer-grade memory kits now cost two or even three times more than they did in 2023 or early 2024.
At the same time, memory availability is inconsistent. Retailers report that high-speed kits sell out faster. Laptop manufacturers are facing higher bill-of-materials costs. Even large enterprise buyers have reported partial fulfillment of bulk memory orders.
In short, demand for memory remains high, supply remains tight, and the market has shifted in favor of suppliers.
Imagine you are a RAM manufacturer. You can only process a finite number of wafers and turn it into RAM every month and each wafer costs you ,000 (numbers made up just to illustrate the point)

 Would you rather:
Turn each wafer into DDR4/DDR5 that you sell to consumers for a total of roughly ,000 per wafer
Turn each wafer into HBM3E that you will sell for datacenter GPUs for a total of roughly 0,000 per wafer

You guessed right, you would choose #2 because you make way more money that way.
Most of the RAM manufacturers are at full capacity, so they're switching production lines to more profitable products while the demand and profit margins are high. They can't realistically expand capacity. If they started now, it'd likely be a minimum of 3 years (and likely longer) before the new production facility was actually up and running. By then, the demand may not even be there because the AI bubble might pop. So at the moment, RAM manufacturers are just sitting tight and maximizing the profit out of their existing plants.

FINAL
The 2025/2026 memory market reflects a major industry shift driven by AI demand, wafer constraints, controlled production strategies, and rising memory requirements across modern devices. Together, these forces have pushed RAM prices to some of the highest levels seen in recent years. While supply conditions are expected to improve over time, higher memory pricing is likely to persist throughout the year. For consumers and businesses planning a hardware upgrade, delaying a purchase may result in paying more for comparable performance as component costs continue to climb.