GPU and RAM Prices 2026: Why AI Ate Your Upgrade

Why: AI data centres buy HBM, fabs prioritise margins, gamers get less

Memory comes from a small number of manufacturers, according to Medium. In 2025-2026, AI data centres bought enormous HBM for accelerators — a wafer into HBM earns far more than into GDDR7 for a gaming card, so fabs prioritise margins and gaming memory drops down the list. HBM is stacked DRAM on the same lines as PC RAM, according to MillionMiner: server DRAM rose 64% in H2 2025, TrendForce expects +270% across 2026, HBM + server take 51% of DRAM bits this year, and memory is set to be 68% of cloud hardware spend in 2027. SK hynix sold all 2026 HBM by October 2025, TrendForce expects HBM to take 30% of DRAM wafers by end-2027 (from 18% end-2025), with HBM prices up 70-140% next year, and Micron expects tighter shortage in 2027-2028 with 75%+ of 2027 DRAM pre-sold, according to MillionMiner and eTeknix. TrendForce calls the market historically tight: DRAM contract prices rose 90-95% QoQ in Q1 2026, NAND 55-60%, then DRAM +58-63% and NAND +70-75% in Q2, according to Tech-Insider. The cause is structural, not a factory fire or crypto boom: AI buys HBM/server DRAM in bulk on long contracts, fabs shift capacity, consumers get what's left at higher prices.

RAM: 32GB DDR5 from $72-$100 to $300-$429, 64GB up 473%

RAM: Tom's Hardware index shows 16Gb DDR5 spot price from $6.84 (Sep 2025) to $27.20 (Dec 2025), +298% in a quarter, according to Medium. A 32GB kit at ~$90 in spring 2025 cost $300-$450 by early 2026, and cheapest kits hover just under $400 now, according to Medium. MillionMiner: 32GB DDR5-6000 sat $80-$100 through 2024-H1 2025, jumped to $364 in October 2025, crossed $400 in September 2026, now $429 vs $72 low; 64GB $222 to $1,272 (+473%) in 12 months; 128GB $3,399, ~10x low; DDR4 32GB $50 to $200. German retail DDR5 is 419% higher than July 2025 per eTeknix, 544% of July 2025 level by September per MillionMiner — different periods/trackers, both 4x-5x. Jefferies expected RAM +40-50% Q3 and +30-40% Q4 2026, little relief before 2028, according to eTeknix — largely played out. Don't wait for $90 32GB again; forecasts say late 2027 earliest, 2028 more likely, and stabilisation may be above 2025 levels.

GPUs: RTX 50 up 66%, RTX 5090 up 132%, RX 9070 XT over $1,000

Memory is now feeding through to graphics cards, according to eTeknix. Nvidia has raised prices a third time in 2026, by 20-30% on some cards, after Samsung lifted DRAM prices by 20%, according to eTeknix. AMD raised Radeon RX 9000 prices by up to 20%, with the RX 9070 XT going from $830 to over $1,000 in the reports from Asian channels, according to eTeknix.

In Germany, RTX 50 prices have climbed 66% on average, and the RTX 5090 by 132%, according to eTeknix. Radeon RX 9000 cards rose 48% and Intel Arc Battlemage 38%, according to eTeknix. German price tracker 3D Center compared retail prices in November 2025 with October 2026 and found the RTX 50 series up 66% on average, according to Medium. The RTX 5090 rose 132%, the only card to more than double, according to Medium. AMD's Radeon RX 9000 cards rose just under 50%, and Intel's Arc cards rose 38%, according to Medium.

Nvidia's RTX 5090 launched at $1,999 in early 2025 and now sells for more than $5,000 at US retail, according to BigGo Finance cited by Tech-Insider. An Asus RTX 5080 that sold for $1,199 has jumped to $1,595 on Amazon, according to Tech-Insider. AMD's RX 9070 XT, once a $830 card, has crossed $1,037 after a Q3 2026 MSRP hike of up to 20%, BigGo Finance reported, according to Tech-Insider. Asking prices tracked by BuySellRam show the cheapest RTX 5090 asking prices rising 60% or more between August and October, according to Medium. The lowest price for a used RTX 5090 rose 60%, and the lowest price for a new one rose 64%, from $3,004 to about $4,921, against a launch price of $1,999, according to Medium.

GPUs use the same kind of memory (GDDR6 and GDDR7), so they're caught in the same squeeze, according to Medium. TrendForce data shows RTX 50 models with 16GB or more of VRAM saw price increases of roughly 15-20%, while wider supply-chain increases across AMD and Nvidia ran 10-15% depending on memory configuration, according to Medium. A GDDR7 chip holds 2GB and now costs about $20, according to MillionMiner. An RTX 5090 carries 16 of them, an RTX PRO 6000 carries 48, which is why the 5090 sells at $4,999 against a $1,999 list price and the PRO 6000 trades at $12,900 to $16,000 on the open market, according to MillionMiner.

Both companies have already raised kit prices this year, according to Medium. In July, AMD reportedly raised its kit prices by about 10%, according to Medium. Later that month, Taiwan's Economic Daily News reported that Nvidia was raising its kit prices by 20% to 30%, following an earlier increase on RTX 5090 kits in May, according to Medium. Stince Built, a US company that builds and sells gaming PCs, posted on X on October 9 that it was "starting to see increasing supply constraints on graphics cards, with allocations becoming more limited," according to Medium. The company blamed AI and data-center demand for memory and said it expects GPU prices to rise significantly and that high prices could last longer, according to Medium.

The main brake right now is Nvidia, after raising its prices to card makers in July, reportedly has no further memory increase planned for this year, according to Medium — so prices may stabilise in late 2026, but not fall, unless memory supply improves. Graphics cards have been expensive for most of 2026, and anyone waiting for a better price before the holidays is likely to be disappointed, according to Medium. On October 9 and 10, a US PC builder warned that its GPU supply is drying up, AMD reportedly raised memory prices for its card partners, and a leaker claimed Nvidia has stopped making the RTX 5090, according to Medium — that last claim is a leak, not confirmed by Nvidia, so treat it as unconfirmed, not as fact.

RTX 50 Super delayed, RTX 60 pushed to 2028, and what to do now

The RTX 50 Super cards have reportedly reached partners, but the high cost of 3GB GDDR7 chips is holding back the launch, according to eTeknix. Nvidia pushed the RTX 50 Super refresh out of 2026 rather than launch new cards into $20 chips, according to MillionMiner. That matches our earlier Article 5 reporting: RTX 50 Super reportedly shelved, RTX 60 leaked slipped from late 2027 to 2028.

Graphics card buyers hoping for a price correction have run out of runway, according to Tech-Insider. New pricing data tracked through September 2026 shows GPU costs climbing for the third time this year, and the underlying cause, a historic memory chip shortage, is now pushing the next generation of gaming GPUs from Nvidia and AMD out to 2028, according to Tech-Insider. There is no meaningful relief window left in 2027, according to Tech-Insider. It is the third coordinated round of GPU price increases from Nvidia and AMD in 2026 alone, following hikes in January and a narrower RTX 5090-only adjustment in May, according to Tech-Insider.

Nvidia and AMD's 2028 flagship launches will likely arrive close together, within the same few months, rather than staggered as in past generations, since both are gated by the same memory supply timeline, according to Tech-Insider. Data-center AI GPU pricing will keep climbing in parallel with consumer GPU pricing, since both draw from the same constrained memory supply chain, meaning relief for gamers is directly tied to when AI infrastructure demand growth finally slows, according to Tech-Insider.

A historic DRAM and NAND memory shortage, driven primarily by AI data-center demand, has pushed component costs sharply higher through 2026, according to Tech-Insider. Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said "No relief until 2028" at Cisco AI Summit in September 2026, according to Tech-Insider. Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said "No line of sight" to balance; supply "much tighter" in fiscal 2027-2028 than 2026, on October 1, 2026, according to Tech-Insider. Silicon Motion, a NAND/SSD controller maker, said combined DRAM, HBM, and NAND shortage could extend into 2028, according to Tech-Insider.

Gartner and IDC expect the global PC market to shrink by 10-11% in 2026, largely because memory costs have pushed retail prices up, according to Medium. The clearest example is Valve's Steam Machine, according to Medium. Industry reporting suggested Valve originally targeted a price closer to $700–800, and that the roughly 30% increase came almost entirely from DDR5 and NVMe storage costs, according to Medium.

What to do if you need a machine now, from Medium's guide and the price data above:

• Don't wait for a price drop before 2028 — forecasts say late 2027 at earliest, 2028 more likely, and even then, stabilisation, not a return to 2025 prices.
• Buy what you need, not what you want: 32GB RAM is now $300-$429, 64GB is $1,272 — so 32GB is the sensible ceiling for most gamers, not 64GB, unless you do video editing or AI work.
• Consider used GPUs, but check prices: used RTX 5090 lowest price rose 60% August-October, so used is not cheap either — but used RTX 40 or RX 7000 cards may be better value than new RTX 50 at current prices, if you can find them at pre-2026 prices.
• Consider consoles or handhelds if PC prices are too high — but note that handhelds and consoles also use memory, so they too have risen, just less than PC components.
• If you can wait, wait until 2028 for RTX 60 / next-gen AMD — but don't wait if you need a PC now for work or study, because prices may rise further in 2027 before they fall.

Verdict: AI ate your upgrade, and it won't give it back soon

GPU and RAM prices in 2026 are not a normal cycle — they're a structural shortage, driven by AI data centres buying HBM and server DRAM on long-term contracts, with fabs prioritising margins. DDR5 32GB went from $72-$100 to $300-$429, 64GB to $1,272, RTX 50 up 66%, RTX 5090 up 132% to $5,000+, RX 9070 XT over $1,000, RTX 50 Super delayed, RTX 60 pushed to 2028, and forecasts say no relief before 2028. If you need a PC now, buy what you need at current prices, consider used or previous-gen, and don't expect a price drop soon. If you can wait, wait until 2028 — but don't hold your breath for 2025 prices to return.