The effects of the AI boom are far-reaching and varied, from optimized business operations to intensified water scarcity issues. Recently, the rise in hyperscale data centers has been making news for causing chaos with IT hardware prices.
In this article, we’ll explore how AI memory demand is affecting availability and prices, and how businesses can protect themselves from price hikes and supply chain disruption without sacrificing performance.
What’s driving the RAM shortage?
AI workloads are often data-intensive, requiring vast amounts of processing power and memory to function effectively. As PC Mag reports, “massive banks of memory are critical to peak AI performance, making memory chips essential to meeting the soaring need for AI power”.
Combined with the rapid and exponential growth of the AI industry, the workloads’ hunger for data processing and memory hardware is consuming RAM, DRAM and GPUs faster than manufacturers can keep up.
Global memory hardware production is now being monopolized by AI-optimized servers in hyperscale data centers.
To make matters worse, the International Data Corporation (IDC) has observed that “voracious” demand from international hyperscalers is pushing semiconductor manufacturers to focus on powerful, ultra-fast high-bandwidth memory (HBM) production rather than on DRAM, further constricting its already-tight availability.
What is RAM, DRAM and semi-conductors?
To understand why AI-optimized servers are causing RAM shortages, we need to know what it actually is.
This table quickly explains what RAM, DRAM and HBM are, and what they have to do with semiconductors:
Driven by rising demand for DRAM and HBM, AI’s impact on the semiconductor industry is severe and set to last for several years. Constraints in raw materials and semiconductor supply are making it increasingly difficult for manufacturers to keep up with production of these memory technologies, resulting in what PC Mag describes as “starved supply, with no drop in demand”.
What do these shortages mean for pricing and availability?
As shortages intensify, AI data centers’ memory demand is causing a serious lack of availability across the IT industry. Businesses are struggling to access the components they need, facing extended lead times and sometimes even cancelled orders.
Meanwhile, DRAM price trends are steadily on the rise. With the shortage forecasted by SK Hynix’s chairman to potentially “last beyond 2028 and persist into 2030”, businesses must adapt their IT strategy to this new reality.
How is the AI boom affecting the SSD market?
Gen AI workloads rely heavily on both DRAM and high-performance SSDs.
While RAM provides short-term memory, SSDs provide permanent data storage, offering the capacity to manage large datasets and improve processing efficiency.
As a result, AI demand for SSD hardware is surging, reducing availability for smaller or more traditional data centers.
Meanwhile, manufacturers are prioritizing high-performance, AI-optimized enterprise SSDs over more general-purpose enterprise storage. This shift in focus is further tightening supply for standard data center workloads, contributing to longer lead times and higher pricing.
Consistent demand and limited supply are driving manufacturers to raise their prices significantly.
Forbes directly attributes the SSD markets’ “sustained period of price escalation” to the AI boom, citing that prices of 30-tetrabyte enterprise SSDs “increased by 472% between Q2 2025 and Q1 2026”.
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How does the RAM price increase affect enterprise data centers?
Of course, this combination of low availability and climbing prices is having a real-time impact on enterprises. Here are some of the most significant ways businesses are seeing their data center operations affected:
Longer and more unpredictable wait times
Whether a business is looking to build out its data center memory infrastructure or refresh its servers, it should expect to face significant delays in delivery. This can have a range of knock-on effects for the company.
For example, a company looking to replace a faulty CPU may have to wait months before receiving a new model. This can lead to extended operational inefficiencies, potentially affecting revenue.
Meanwhile, an enterprise aiming to upgrade its infrastructure to stay competitive may find itself losing its edge in the market.
Elevated costs
The exploding prices of DRAM have been well-documented in recent months. In December 2025, The Register reported that “major manufacturers including Dell, Lenovo, HP, and HPE are planning price increases of around 15 percent for servers”. Meanwhile, Tom’s Hardware have noted “triple and, in some cases, quadruple increases” in DDR5 memory prices in the past trimester.
While rising hardware costs place strain on current enterprise IT budgets, their unpredictability makes budget planning exceedingly difficult. A business may allocate a set portion of its budget to memory, only to find that costs have increased dramatically between planning and the time of purchase.
This uncertainty is exacerbated by major manufacturers changing the prices even after a sale has been agreed.
Increased risk
Delayed hardware deliveries can not only extend existing operational inefficiencies, but also open the door to security risks.
Existing systems running on outdated or unsupported hardware may miss critical security updates during the delay. This leaves them more vulnerable to cyberthreats and data breaches. In some cases, enterprises may find themselves having to rely on temporary fixes to bridge the gap or using unsupported legacy infrastructure.
Without adequate third-party support, depending on EOSL hardware can increase the likelihood of system failures and security vulnerabilities.
Limited scaling opportunities
RAM is a critical part of a server, enabling the fast data processing required for day-to-day operations. Without access to the necessary servers or memory components, businesses may be unable to scale their data center infrastructures as planned.
This can result in an inability to meet growing demand or adapt to changing workloads.
How businesses can respond to shortages and price hikes
The effects of AI’s memory demand are shining a spotlight on an increasingly obvious truth: the linear IT lifecycle and traditional, OEM-established refresh cycles cannot and do not work in the existing market.
Costs and supply chain disruptions mean that blind server refreshes are no longer an option.
However, with smart and agile IT strategies, businesses can continue their data center operations seamlessly and even scale their operations. Let’s look at how businesses are managing memory shortages in their data centers while reducing their IT infrastructure costs:
Lifecycle extension through maintenance
Extending the lifecycle of data center equipment through comprehensive maintenance, patches and optimizations can help delay the need for hardware refreshes. This avoids the costs and wait-time issues many businesses are now facing when ordering new components.
After hardware’s EOL or EOSL dates, businesses can shift to third-party maintenance to ensure full support for their legacy hardware. This in turn enhances security and helps to guarantee regulatory compliance. Maintenance services often include, although are not limited to:
- Inspections
- Monitoring
- Diagnostics
- Repairs
- Part-replacements
- Optimizations
Extend the lifecycle of your memory hardware with TPM
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Refurbished components
When a CPU or memory chip does need to be replaced, or if a business simply wants to upgrade their hardware, investing in refurbished parts can avoid the elevated prices and elongated wait times of the new market.
Since the circular market does not rely on new manufacturing, choosing refurbished assets sidesteps the supply chain disruptions facing new models, while also presenting far lower prices. For example, Evernex’s on-demand Spare as a Service – SPaaSTM guarantees delivery of certified, secure, refurbished components in 72 hours or less.
Refurbished parts allow greater budget control, as well as faster delivery and deployment.
Certified refurbished components are restored to their original condition, ensuring the same performance, security, and resilience as when it was brand-new. This allows businesses to scale or refresh their infrastructures quickly and affordably without sacrificing their operational efficiency.
The future of RAM prices
The RAM price forecast for 2026 and beyond is only going up, despite some brief stabilization in recent weeks. To avoid the risks and budget strains of a choked supply chain and unpredictable costs, businesses must adapt their refresh and scaling strategy.
This means prioritizing the lifecycles of existing, usable equipment and supporting the circular market. With higher, faster availability and lower prices, the circular economy is already supporting businesses.
About the author:
Marko Ristic is an experienced Sales Engineer with over 12 years at Evernex, specializing in infrastructure solutions and Spare as a Service – SPaaS™. As an HPE Brand Specialist, he brings deep expertise across platforms including HPE, HP9000, Integrity, 3PAR, Nimble, Apollo, DEC, and Synergy. Combining strong technical knowledge with a strategic sales approach, Marko drives growth through prospecting, lead generation, and relationship management, while leveraging market insights to optimize inventory, support global sales teams, and enhance customer engagement.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is RAM?
RAM (Random-Access Memory) is the high-speed, short-term memory used by a server’s CPU. It stores data and instructions temporarily for immediate processing.
What is the difference between RAM and DRAM?
DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) is a type of RAM. In general, RAM stores data as long as it has power. However, DRAM needs to be refreshed constantly to retain that data.
Why has RAM gone up so much in price?
RAM prices have risen dramatically in recent months due to a huge increase in demand from hyperscalers. The AI boom means that the market cannot keep up with consumption and supply is limited, driving up prices.
How can I save money on RAM purchases?
Businesses can save costs when purchasing memory by shifting from brand-new products to certified refurbished components. Refurbishing restores parts to their original specifications, then resells them for a much lower price than the brand-new market. This also avoids wait times caused by supply chain disruptions.
