AMD Expects DDR5 RAM Pricing to Stay Elevated Until 2028
If you've been waiting for DDR5 memory to get cheap again, here's the gut punch: it's going to be a while. An AMD exec reckons RAM pricing won't get back to normal until around 2028. That came from David McAfee, VP and general manager of Ryzen CPU and Radeon Graphics, speaking at Computex 2026.
Asked about the ongoing memory shortage, McAfee said he expects prices to recover slowly in the future, but that DDR5 won't return to normal levels for roughly another two years. Worth keeping in mind, this was a translated interview, so there's a little wiggle room in exactly how his words landed. Still, the headline is clear enough — don't hold your breath for a quick fix.
Why 2028 Might Actually Be the Optimistic Scenario
Here's the part that stings. McAfee's 2028 timeline is, believe it or not, on the cheerier end of what people in the industry are saying. He's lining up with the forecasters who think the RAM crisis eases off during 2028. And honestly? Compared to some of the more recent predictions, that almost sounds like good news.
Take Nvidia's CEO, Jensen Huang, who said the memory crisis will last "quite a few years" — which points more toward 2029 or 2030 before we see the worst of it behind us. Others have thrown out guesses landing around 2030 too. So when an AMD exec says 2028, that's not the doom-and-gloom outlier. It's the relatively rosy one. Think about that for a second.
The honest truth is, if someone could hand over a guaranteed end-in-2028 outcome for these RAM woes, you'd take that deal and run.
What "Normal" Pricing Actually Means Here
Now, there's a fair question buried in all this: what does McAfee even mean by "normal levels"? The translation muddies it a bit, but broadly, the read is that prices will eventually drop back to more palatable levels compared to where they sit right now. That's not the same as pre-crisis pricing, though. Nobody's seriously expecting RAM to return to what it cost before all this kicked off. More bearable than today? Sure. Back to the good old days? Probably not.
A Faint Glimmer of Hope from Chinese Chipmakers
It's a bleak outlook, no sugar-coating it. But there's a small flicker of optimism, and it's coming from Chinese memory chip makers ramping up production. McAfee himself pointed to Changxin Memory in China boosting its DDR5 production capacity as one reason for cautious hope.
The catch? Not everyone's buying it. Huang, for one, seems distinctly unmoved by that argument. So you've got two camps here — one that sees increased Asian production chipping away at the shortfall, and another that shrugs and says it won't move the needle nearly enough.
The AI Wildcard Hanging Over Everything
A lot of how this plays out comes down to AI. And that's not exactly reassuring. The predictions point to increased memory demand one way or another in the AI space, with no real sign of the AI "bubble" bursting any time soon. There's been hope that clever tech innovations might ease the pressure, but those hopes look overblown — the kind of fix some folks expect simply isn't materializing the way they'd like. Add it all up, and there's not much room for optimism on the whole.
Lenovo's Rumored Price Hikes Pile On More Misery
As if the memory situation weren't enough, there's fresh chatter from the rumor mill about Lenovo. The theory: Lenovo plans to jack up prices in China by the equivalent of $150 in July. And we're not just talking PCs and laptops — supposedly this hits every product line the company sells. Common sense suggests the cheap stuff, like a basic Lenovo mouse, won't suddenly cost $150 more, but the broad-strokes plan is reportedly across the board.
It's worth flagging this is rumored, and it's a move centered on Asia. But here's the thing — it would make complete sense for similar cost increases (maybe even a touch steeper) to roll out in other regions too. These things rarely stay contained to one market.
And this isn't Lenovo's first move. The company already pushed through PC price hikes earlier this year, so this would be yet another helping of RAM crisis-related cost rises landing on laptops, desktops, and apparently other hardware besides.
Why Now Might Be the Right Time to Buy a Laptop
Put all of this together and the takeaway gets pretty pointed. With the memory crisis stretching toward the end of the decade in some predictions, and with Lenovo potentially about to pull the trigger on more substantial PC price rises, the case for buying a laptop now only gets stronger. Because if one major vendor moves on pricing, it's hard to imagine it happening in isolation — other PC makers tend to follow. Waiting around for prices to magically improve looks like a losing bet for the foreseeable future.