The relentless climb in memory prices may finally be easing, as consumers reach the upper limits of what they're willing to pay for PCs and smartphones. Taiwanese market analyst TrendForce estimates that conventional DRAM contract price growth will "moderate" to 13 to 18 percent quarter-on-quarter in Q3, down sharply from the blistering pace that drove a 59.5 percent quarter-on-quarter surge in industry revenue to $154.73 billion in calendar Q2. The forecast signals that while prices continue climbing, the rate of increase is slowing as demand patterns shift and customer budgets hit their breaking point.
TrendForce attributes the deceleration to a shift in demand away from high-capacity RDIMMs toward lower-capacity products, alongside "the limited ability of PC and smartphone customers to absorb further price increases." Meanwhile, market intelligence firm Context forecasts European laptop shipments will drop 6.4 percent year-on-year in Q3, followed by a 20 percent plunge in Q4. Desktop shipments face an even grimmer outlook, with declines expected around 20 percent in Q3 and nearly 30 percent in Q4. Despite shrinking shipments, PC manufacturers have maintained profitability, as higher prices have more than offset falling volumes so far.
The analyst warns that supplier inventories remain at historic lows, and total bit shipments are projected to grow only modestly. That means prices are rising more gradually but supplies will likely stay tight for the foreseeable future. Context senior analyst Marie-Christine Pygott notes that corporate buyers are stretching refresh cycles wherever feasible and purchasing new PCs only when upgrades are unavoidable: "The PC refresh cycle has not disappeared, but the economics around it have changed." As for AI PCs that manufacturers hoped would spark a mass upgrade wave, Context reports the end of Windows 10 support was the main driver of recent buying activity, while AI functionality is becoming standard in newer devices primarily because it's now built into most new systems entering the supply chain.
The price pressure traces back to the three major memory makers—Samsung, SK hynix, and Micron—continuing to prioritize high-end products for the AI market, according to TrendForce. Samsung benefited from its early transition into HBM4 mass production, while SK hynix shipped the highest proportion of HBM among the three leading suppliers. Micron is focusing on higher-priced server DRAM. That strategy has left second-tier manufacturers like Nanya, Winbond, and PSMC to satisfy demand for mature-process products such as DDR4 and DDR3. The forecast suggests that as mainstream customers balk at escalating component costs, the memory industry faces a fork: AI-driven revenue growth in premium segments versus shrinking volumes and buyer resistance in consumer markets. The channel's opportunity now lies in helping customers decide where refreshes are essential, where devices can stay in service longer, and where investment in newer systems makes commercial sense. Corporate buyers may find themselves navigating an extended period of strategic trade-offs, weighing the productivity gains of new hardware against budgets strained by component costs that remain elevated even as their rate of increase moderates.