Why everything from your phone to your PC may get pricier in 2026

6 hours ago Share Save Tom Gerken Technology reporter Share Save

Getty Images Ram is a part of every computer you use

The cost of lots of the devices we all use could be forced up in 2026 because the price of Ram - once one of the cheapest computer components - has more than doubled since October 2025. The tech powers everything from smartphones to smart TVs, as well as things like medical devices. Its price has shot up because of the explosive growth in the data centres which power AI, which need Ram too. That's caused an imbalance between supply and demand which means everyone has to pay more. Manufacturers often choose to swallow small cost increases, but big ones tend to get passed on to consumers. And these increases are anything but small.

"We are being quoted costs around 500% higher than they were only a couple of months ago," said Steve Mason, general manager of CyberPowerPC, which builds computers. He said there "will come a point" where these increased component costs will "force" manufacturers to "make decisions about pricing". "If it uses memory, or storage, there is the potential for price increases," he said. "The manufacturers will have choices to make, as will consumers." Ram - or random access memory - is used to store code while you use a device. It is a critical component of almost every kind of computer. Without it would be impossible for you to read this article, for example. And with the component being so ubiquitous, Danny Williams from rival computer building site PCSpecialist said he expected price increases to continue "well into 2026". "The market has been very buoyant in 2025 and if memory prices do not fall back a little I would expect a reduction in consumer demand in 2026," he said. He said he'd seen "a varied impact" across different Ram producers. "Some vendors have larger inventories and therefore their price increases are more subtle at perhaps 1.5x to 2x," he said. But he said other firms did not have a large amount of stock - and they had increased prices by "up to 5x" more.

AI making prices rise

Chris Miller, author of Chip War, called AI "the main factor" driving demand for computer memory. "There's been a surge of demand for memory chips, driven above all by the high-end High Bandwidth Memory that AI requires," he said. "This has led to higher prices across different types of memory chips." He said prices "often fluctuate dramatically" based on "demand and supply" - and demand is significantly up right now. And Mike Howard from Tech Insights told the BBC it came down to cloud service providers finalising their memory requirements for 2026 and 2027. He said that gave the people who make Ram a clear picture of demand - and it was "unmistakeable" that supply "will not meet the levels that Amazon, Google, and other hyperscalers are planning for". "With both demand clarity and supply constraints converging, suppliers have steadily pushed prices upward, in some cases aggressively," he said. "Some suppliers have even paused issuing price quotes, a rare move that signals confidence that future prices will rise further." He said some manufacturers will have seen this coming and built up their inventory ahead of time to help mitigate the price rises - but called those firms "outliers". "In PCs, memory typically accounts for 15 to 20 percent of total cost, but current pricing has pushed that toward 30 to 40 percent," he said. "Margins in most consumer categories are not deep enough to absorb these increases."

The bottom line for 2026