Memory shortages are expected to have a serious impact on the PC and smartphone market.

The International Data Corporation (IDC) has published a new update to its device market outlook, and the message is blunt: things are getting worse. Under newly-reported pessimistic scenarios, shipments of PCs could shrink by up to 9% in 2026, with a more moderate scenario showing a 5% shrinkage in the market. These figures have been revised from a 2.5% drop, which was recently published in IDC’s November forecast.

Since then, the global memory shortage, which began accelerating in mid-October, has intensified beyond what IDC originally modeled. While the firm isn’t formally rewriting its official forecast entirely, it’s now laying out scenarios that are notably more pessimistic than what it projected just a few weeks ago.

The underlying driver is the same force distorting much of the tech industry in late 2025: AI infrastructure. Memory demand from hyperscalers has surged so aggressively that DRAM and NAND production has been structurally redirected away from consumer devices and toward high-margin enterprise components like high-bandwidth memory and dense DDR5. This is an economically rational choice on the part of memory manufacturers, but IDC is clear that this isn’t a typical boom-and-bust cycle; it’s a strategic reallocation of silicon capacity that could persist for years, not quarters.

  • Hirom@beehaw.org
    6·
    2 hours ago

    Meanwhile, Microsoft is making 400 million PCs obsolete by ending Win10 and setting arbitrary requirements for Win11. This is causing perfectly fine hardware (and RAM) to end-up as e-waste, so that it can be replace by new, more expensive Win11 compatible hardware.

    Now is a good time to buy second-hand hardware and abandon Windows.

  • ashughes@feddit.uk
    2·
    2 hours ago

    shipments of PCs could shrink by up to 9% in 2026

    I’ll be shocked if it’s not at least double that. Thing is, this is going to be like the covid-19-crypto-bro-GPU-pocalypse that drove up GPU prices so much we now just collectively accept paying double.

    Except this time it’s not just GPUs. It’s now hitting RAM, SSDs, HDDs, CPUs, Laptops, probably next year’s smartphones, and who knows what’s next. Motherboards? Power supplies? Cases? Everything else?

    It’s not just that these companies are all cannibalizing their consumer capacity for AI customers and it’s not just the hardware they’re buying. As consumer demand plummets because they can no longer afford PCs, companies will reduce consumer production even further because waning demand. It’s a feedback loop whose only killswitch is economic collapse.

    Sure we might be able to seek refuge for a while in the secondhand market, but that won’t be our saviour either. As demand increases in the secondhand market, a market with a largely fixed (and likely dwindling) supply, expect sellers to increase their prices too. Whether they’re trying to recoup costs from the first-wave price increase they paid buying new hardware, or just because they know the market can bare inflated prices that are somewhat less inflate compared to new.

    And what do we have to look forward to? Prices will “settle” to 2-3x what they were last year compared to 5-6x as today. That’s if there’s a manufacturer left who hasn’t abandoned the consumer segment by that point.

    I’m just coming to terms with the fact that the computer I built 2 years ago is probably my last, and my ability to help my neighbours fix their computers probably has a near expiry date. This has been a hobby of mine for decades that the rich have always fought against. With the AI bubble, they may have finally found a way to kill it completely.

    I hope I’m wrong but I’m genuinely worried about this. For now I’ll have to wait and see how things go, look to the secondhand market for my next build, and maybe, start learning to solder.

  • Zikeji@programming.devEnglish
    3·
    4 hours ago

    I was looking at building a new PC but I can’t stomach paying 5x the price for RAM. I’ll just have to wait it out. Though if the price of components other than RAM lower I might consider buying up parts, I’ll just have to watch.

  • HubertManne@piefed.socialEnglish
    2·
    4 hours ago

    Its sorta funny because often times the top of the line processors with bad cores were recycled into lower end processors. Seems perfect for this situation with a ramp up in production for industry and then sell the lower level things to consumers.

  • TheFeatureCreature@lemmy.caEnglish
    14·
    8 hours ago

    I built my current PC about a year and a half ago (maybe 2 years?) and it has 64gb of DDR5.

    The same RAM kit I have is still for sale and now retails for $900CAD. That’s nearly a 400% increase over what I paid.

  • Toast28@piefed.socialEnglish
    41·
    8 hours ago

    I just grabbed 128 GB (8x16GB sticks) Hyniy PC4 EEC from an old server work was recycling. Anyone want to guess at the selling price for those?