DDR5 prices are expected to rise. Buy your gaming RAM now

Gaming RAMDDR5 variant in particular is about to see a significant price hike as reports suggest that SK Hynix, likely followed by Samsung and Micron, will increase prices of DRAM chips, which will then impact memory sticks. This comes after a rough patch for DRAM prices as demand for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) for AI use skyrocketed while resources required to manufacture DDR5 memory were reallocated, leading to this delayed price hike.

All signs point to the fact that if you need the best gaming RAM like the Corsair Vengeance LPX, now is the time to buy. The price increases aren't entirely surprising, but an expected jump is reason enough to jump in before the changes take effect.

The immediate price increases are reported by Taiwan Economic Daily, which suggests that SK Hynix will increase its DDR5 prices by 20%, a 15% increase from the previous offering. Meanwhile, DRAM and NAND flash prices are expected to hit an all-time high, peaking in 2025. According to TrendForce, manufacturers are expected to generate more than double the forecasted annual sales of 2023.

The main cause of this variability is HBM, which is incredibly expensive and critical to AI operations. Although it represents less than 5% of total memory shipped, its cost and production requirements still have a significant impact on the production of other memory types.

Manufacturing resources used for DDR5 production will be diverted to meet HBM's orders, which are currently sold out until 2025 due to exhaustion of production capacity.

The end result is a price increase for customers, as companies like SK Hynix, Samsung and Micron must now account for their reduced DDR5 production by increasing prices on what they expect to offer. The goal is to dampen some of the demand and prevent their DDR5 allocation from being completely used up.

While this all sounds pretty alarming, it's worth reiterating that the price increase is expected to be around 20%. That's a good reason to buy now, but we don't expect the kind of pricing and availability issues that plagued graphics cards, for example, during the pandemic.

And as for the notable RAM increases, we've recently seen Nvidia GPUs with double the VRAM, but not everything is as it seems.