German DDR5 Memory Price Index Hits Record High, Up 54.4% Year on Year

Germany's DDR5 memory price index has set a new all-time record, with overall prices up 54.4% from the same period in 2025. DDR5 prices have been on a sustained upward path since the start of 2026, and the pace of increases accelerated further in the third quarter, with a number of mainstream capacity and specification products successively breaking previous price highs.

In specific market terms, prices for mainstream products such as 16GB×2 kits, 24GB×2 kits and 32GB×2 kits are generally higher than in the same period of 2025, and some high-frequency, low-latency models have risen by more than the overall market average. Desktop memory aimed at ordinary consumers, as well as high-frequency DDR5 products used in high-performance gaming platforms and workstations, have all recorded increases of varying degrees. Tight supply in the memory market persists.

This round of price increases is linked to changes in the supply structure for memory chips. During 2025 and 2026, major memory manufacturers including Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix and Micron continued to adjust production resources, directing more advanced manufacturing capacity into the high-margin HBM high-bandwidth memory segment to meet growing demand from the artificial intelligence server market. As a large share of capacity shifts to HBM, production resources for DDR5 and GDDR graphics memory for the consumer market have declined accordingly, and supply has become tight. Competition across the artificial intelligence industry for advanced packaging, wafer fabrication and memory resources has also pushed up costs across the entire supply chain.

On the demand side, AMD and Intel have shifted to DDR5 platforms, leaving new PC builders essentially unable to choose DDR4 options. As DDR5 gradually becomes the mainstream standard for desktop and notebook computers, market demand continues to grow, while supply has not expanded in step. At present, the upward price trend shows no clear sign of easing. For ordinary consumers, the impact is reflected in higher costs for building a complete system. During 2025 and 2026, prices for graphics cards, memory and some storage products have all risen under the influence of demand from the artificial intelligence industry, pushing up the cost of upgrading to new platforms.