Soaring memory prices led by DDR4 and DDR5 are spooking users, which are buying as soon as they receive a quote, hoarding what they can get and accepting that they may not get what they want.

According to Yicai Global, the financial news arm of Shanghai Media Group, in August 8GB DDR4 modules were selling below $12:60, but in September they rose about 44% to $14-18.

Memory Supercycle roars onIn October, 16GB DDR4 modules rose around $25.20 to $44-60, while 16GB DDR5 modules reached roughly $73, says Yicai.

A Lenovo 16GB DDR5 module that stayed at around $40 from May to early September has risen to around $80 and a Samsung 16GB DDR5 module selling near $52 in September is now over $100.

Spot prices of DDR5 chips rose 30% last week, says TrendForce.

DRAM avg spot price

Last week, Samsung increased the contract price for 32 GB DDR5 modules from $149 to $239 and the price of 16GB DDR5 and 128GB DDR5 modules by about 50% to $135 and $1,194 respectively, reports Reuters, while prices of 64GB DDR5 and 96GB DDR5 are reported to have gone up by more than 30%.

However, there is not much hope of relief for users. DRAM capex of $53.7bn in 2025 is expected to rise about 14% to $61.3bn in 2026, but it will not be going into capacity but into process technology upgrades, higher-layer stacking, hybrid bonding and high-value products such as HBM.

Micron is expected to be the most aggressive investor among DRAM suppliers, with the company’s 2026 CapEx projected at $13.5bn, up 23% y-o-y, and focusing primarily on 1-gamma node adoption and expanding TSV equipment.

Hynix is expected to spend $20.5bn, up 17% y-o-y, thanks to HBM4 capacity expansion at the M15x fab.

DRAM and NAND Flash capex Samsung plans to invest $20bn—up 11% y-o-y—to advance 1C process HBM production and slightly expand P4L wafer capacity.

The effects are being seen in consumer markets. Yicai reports that the 2TB iPhone 17 Pro Max now costs $560 more than the 1TB model.

Also, SMIC says its customers for logic are delaying Q1 orders because of the shortage of memories.

By: DocMemory
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