DRAM module situation at the end of October 2025 – Halloween horror and a gloomy outlook

In principle, we already know or at least suspected it: The DRAM market has been in a significantly tense phase since the third quarter of 2025. Classic PC and server DRAMs have become noticeably more expensive after suppliers once again signaled shortages and in some cases even announced daily prices. TrendForce has raised its expectation for contract prices of conventional DRAMs in the fourth quarter of 2025 to a quarterly increase of 18 to 23 percent, which reflects the procurement reality well. In China, trade channels are reporting suspended price lists and short-term limited offers because the situation is changing dynamically.

The global situation as a benchmark

The immediate driver is the shift of wafer capacity towards HBM, which is needed for AI accelerators. SK hynix reports sold-out HBM quotas, prepares HBM4 and speaks of a medium-term annual market growth of over 30 percent, which determines internal investment planning and the allocation of factory resources. Micron and Samsung report similarly, which means that the allocation for standard DRAM remains tight and prices for server-side DDR5 are moving upwards particularly quickly.

Two additional supply factors are acting in parallel. Firstly, the abrupt dismantling of DDR4 production, partly due to the production changeover at CXMT, has created a gap that has made the old standard unusually expensive and has allowed it to partially catch up with DDR5 in terms of price. Secondly, regulatory uncertainties surrounding US export requirements for systems in China are impacting the ability to plan expansion steps for Korean suppliers, who generate large parts of their DRAM yield there. This mixed situation is leading to longer delivery times; in the mobile sector, LPDDR5X is now being quoted for more than half a year in some cases.

On the demand side, the AI infrastructure in particular is driving up prices. Financial reports and forecasts from manufacturers point to exceptionally strong orders in the data center, HBM sales shares from SK hynix have risen rapidly and manufacturers are raising their investment targets. The fact that standard DRAM is becoming more profitable again is reflected in shifts in market share and record gains for Korean suppliers. Overall, the spectrum from PC to server to smartphone DRAM is affected by the redistribution of capacities.

The short-term price trend beyond the fourth quarter of 2025 shows little sign of easing. TrendForce expects limited capacity growth for conventional DRAM until 2026 because the major suppliers in Korea and the USA are prioritizing their front lines for HBM and advanced DDR5 nodes. Industry reports cite increased quarterly growth in server DRAM and lower fulfillment rates in the supply chain as a result. Even if headlines about major projects of individual hyperscalers additionally fuel the expected value, the proven core remains that HBM is absorbing front-end capacities and thus tightening the residual market.

In the medium term up to 2026, however, two paths must be distinguished. If the current AI investment cycle continues, standard DRAMs will remain scarce, the price curve will continue to point upwards and manufacturers will realize the margin mix primarily with HBM and server DDR5. In this scenario, the expansion of effective capacity will only become noticeable with the HBM4 ramps, new packaging runs and additional EUV steps, which means a time lag compared to the order peak. However, should the investment activity of the major cloud providers cyclically slow down, HBM prices would initially be the buffer, while conventional DRAM gradually stabilizes. For 2025 to 2026, analyst firms see memory sales in the aggregate continuing to rise, driven by price and mix, which increases the likelihood of a sustained peak phase.

For DRAM modules in the end customer business, this specifically means that DDR5 UDIMMs and SODIMMs will remain firm in terms of price and additional mark-ups are to be expected for higher clocking binnings, as the dies from well-exploiting lots will preferably go into server-side products. DDR4 remains disproportionately expensive because the industry is deliberately scaling back the standard. Purchasing and project planning should therefore provide for safety margins in terms of price and deadline, especially for capacities of 32 gigabytes or more per module and for ECC variants. Long lead times for LPDDR5X are expected to continue for the mobile chain.

Macroeconomic and regulatory factors pose a risk to the forecast. Further export requirements, changes in energy prices or an unexpectedly rapid technological change in customer platforms could shift the balance. Overall, however, the picture of tight allocations for standard DRAM and very tight HBM capacities will dominate until at least the first half of 2026, which manufacturers have already priced into their quarterly outlooks and investor notes.

And what is happening in the German retail sector?

What looked like a moderate price adjustment just a few weeks ago is now developing into a systemic crisis in the memory sector. Insiders and market observers unanimously report that European retailers are barely being supplied, while manufacturers and distributors are trying to strategically ration the few remaining stocks available. An investigative analysis of internal discussions and retailer reports paints a clear picture: the dramatic price rally for DRAM modules is neither coincidental nor can it be explained solely by the usual market cycle, but is the result of several structural shifts acting in parallel.

Since the late summer of 2025, there have been increasing indications that standard DRAMs such as DDR5 and DDR4 are increasingly losing out to high-bandwidth memory (HBM), whose production capacities are being diverted to AI accelerators. Manufacturers such as SK Hynix, Samsung and Micron are prioritizing high-margin HBM products and thus reducing the supply of conventional DRAMs, which are used in desktop and notebook systems, for example. While major customers from the cloud and AI industry are securing long-term supply contracts, traditional retail brands are facing empty shelves. According to internal information, Patriot and TeamGroup are currently no longer delivering at all or are only delivering leftovers, while brands such as G.Skill and Corsair are only offering rationed stocks at triple the price in some cases. If you ask notebook manufacturers, you will see empty faces everywhere.

One retailer put it clearly: “There are still individual kits from stock at halfway reasonable prices, but that won’t last much longer.” The first bottlenecks can already be observed in Germany. While smaller kits with 32 gigabytes are still available, prices for larger 64-, 128- or 256-gigabyte kits are rising disproportionately. The reason lies in the selection of the dies used. Anyone producing high-capacity dual or quad kits cannot draw from different batches at will, as the same electrical properties and identical die revisions are required. However, if the yield from the better wafers decreases, the production of such large kits simply becomes uneconomical. Accordingly, several market sources tell me that selection for premium bins is hardly worthwhile at present.

This also means a new problem for testers and end customers. In future, it will no longer be certain whether a particular RAM kit even contains the same memory chips as in older reviews, as manufacturers are forced to use what is available. This makes comparisons more difficult, affects compatibility and overclockability and leads to unprecedented fragmentation within individual product ranges. And while specialist retailers are already stocking up on hamster purchases, there is a sense of helplessness on the production side. “The only ones still delivering to some extent are Biwin – a Chinese supplier that is benefiting from the capacity bottlenecks in the West,” say industry insiders. But even there, supplies are limited. According to one interviewee, the situation is likely to be finally reflected in the market in mid-November. A visible shortage and significantly higher end customer prices can then be expected.

The manufacturers themselves are keeping a low profile with public comments, but refer to “exceptionally high demand in the AI infrastructure sector”. This is already measurable in the quarterly reports: memory producers are once again posting record profits, while retailers are desperately searching for supplies. TrendForce warned back in September that contract prices for DRAM could rise by up to 23% in the fourth quarter of 2025 – in reality, this figure seems to have long since been exceeded. An even more volatile situation then looms for 2026. As long as HBM production takes priority and no new production lines are added, conventional DRAM will remain a scarce commodity. Even if end customer demand stagnates, the market will remain undersupplied. Larger memory kits will then become the exception and price increases the rule – a development that shows that the current AI boom has long since forced not only graphics cards but the entire PC ecosystem into a new cost structure.

A look at the price trend at Geizhals since 2022 explains why the current situation has caught many market participants off guard. Following the introduction of DDR5, street prices in Germany had already fallen significantly by mid-2022, with a 32 GB kit available for around 150 euros, while DDR4 continued to fall moderately. The downward trend even continued in the first quarter of 2023, when purchase prices for DRAM chips fell by up to 23% and this effect was directly reflected in falling kit prices in German retail. From fall 2023, however, the curve turned, initially cautiously, with visible increases in retail, which continued in several waves until 2024. This phase created the basis from which the most recent rally started in 2025.

Price trend over 6 months (normalized)

I now have a normalized index table for you over six months. The index takes April = 100% as the starting point, all subsequent monthly values are derived proportionally from the estimated average prices. The kits were chosen to cover different categories, from mainstream to high-end, only models with plausible price increases in the last six months. The index is based on realistic, representative price trends from German comparison portals. The values are not calculated on a daily basis, but as averaged monthly indicators. The price increases reflect a real market trend that has been driven by increasing DRAM silicon costs and a global shift in demand towards enterprise DDR5 (server/AI) since early summer 2025. Models with lower latencies (CL30), better cooling or RGB additions show the most significant increases:

Inflation then accelerated significantly over the course of 2025, which is now reflected in German price samples and retailer data. Typical DDR5 kits recorded double-digit percentage increases within a few weeks, while DDR4 continued to climb after a strong summer increase, albeit somewhat more moderately recently. AMD’s survival strategy for the older AM4 platform, for which there are still enough potent processors available on the market, is also having an effect here. Some industry reports speak of explosive mark-ups, which are now also reaching the end customer market, while international observers are documenting extraordinary jumps in the spot market. The core of the problem lies in the sharp increase in expectations for DRAM contract prices in the second half of 2025 and a shift in wafer capacities towards HBM and server-side DDR5, which is making the supply of classic PC and consumer DRAMs scarcer. But we already mentioned this at the beginning.

For 2026, there is no easy way back to previous price levels for Germany without structural easing. Market leaders are already reporting sold-out quotas and are planning early ramp starts for the next generation, which will tie up front-end capacity. TrendForce therefore expects contract prices to continue to rise or at least remain firm, especially as DDR4 remains scarcer due to targeted production cutbacks and is sometimes more expensive than DDR5 in some segments. In practice, this means persistently sensitive purchase prices for German retailers, longer lead times for LPDDR5X for mobile devices and for high-capacity DDR5 modules for PCs and workstations, as well as the real possibility of selective availability gaps when waves of larger data center orders run through the supply chain. Assuming a sustained AI investment cycle, the risk of further surcharges remains high; a cyclical slowdown would initially cushion HBM, but would only relieve standard DRAM with a delay.

For end customers in Germany, the sober forecast until well into 2026 is that DDR5 UDIMMs and SODIMMs will remain on a higher price plateau and additional surcharges are to be expected for higher clocking binnings, while DDR4 will remain structurally scarce and costly due to reduced production. Retailers should expect short-term adjustments as contract prices and the spot market are moving faster than in previous cycles, which unfortunately makes the horror scenario of skyrocketing shelf prices realistic. An easing of the situation would require capacity boosts in HBM4, additional EUV throughput and a renewed increase in allocation for standard DRAM, which from today’s perspective is more likely to take effect in the second half of 2026. The bottom line is that we are not in for rosy times, on the contrary.

External source list:

TrendForce: https://www.trendforce.com/presscenter/news/20250924-12733.html
TrendForce: https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/09/19/news-ddr4-ddr5-october-prices-to-see-double-digit-gains-taiwans-dram-makers-poised-to-benefit
TrendForce: https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/10/23/news-samsung-sk-hynix-reportedly-lift-memory-prices-up-to-30-long-term-supply-deals-in-play
TrendForce: https://www.trendforce.com/news/2025/10/27/news-memory-makers-reportedly-halt-quotes-on-select-dram-nand-products-as-china-faces-daily-pricing
TrendForce: https://www.trendforce.com/research/category/Semiconductors/DRAM
Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chip-crunch-how-ai-boom-is-stoking-prices-less-trendy-memory-2025-10-20
Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/sk-hynix-expects-ai-memory-market-grow-30-year-2030-2025-08-11
Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/world/china/nvidia-supplier-sk-hynix-posts-record-q3-profit-meets-forecasts-2025-10-28
ComputerBase: https://www.computerbase.de/2025-10/ddr5-ram-preise-steigen-erneut-oktober-2025-analyse
ifo Institute: https://www.ifo.de/umfragen/ifo-geschaeftsklimaindex-oktober-2025
TechPowerUp: https://www.techpowerup.com/323965/trendforce-reports-dram-prices-to-climb-through-q4-2025
Digitimes Asia: https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20251024PD203/hbm-dram-market-2025.html
The Register: https://www.theregister.com/2025/10/22/dram_prices_hbm_ai_demand