How much more expensive are RAM, SSDs and HDDs than they were a year ago?
Some types of RAM cost five times as much as they did a year ago. Meanwhile, prices of SSDs and HDDs haven’t risen quite as dramatically. The situation is unlikely to ease up any time soon.
Memory prices have soared – but by how much?
In this article, I’ll be comparing the current prices with those from late August 2025. I’ve taken a sample based on the average prices of some especially popular products in four categories:
- DDR5: Three kits, each 2 × 16 gigabytes (GB) (1, 2, 3) and 2 × 32 GB (1, 2, 3) from Corsair, G.Skill, and Kingston, running at 6000 MT/s.
- DDR5: Three kits, each 2 × 8 gigabytes (GB) (1, 2, 3) and 2 × 16 GB (1, 2, 3) from Corsair, G.Skill, and Kingston, running at 3200 MT/s.
- SSDs: Three modules, each with 1 terabyte (TB) (1, 2, 3), 2 TB (1, 2, 3), and 4 TB (1, 2, 3) from Samsung, Western Digital and Kingston.
- HDDs: Two hard drives with 2 TB (1, 2), 4 TB (1, 2) and 8 TB (1, 2) hard drives each from Seagate and Western Digital.
If you’re interested in price trends for other specific components, you’ll find them on the relevant product page.
DDR5 has seen the most dramatic price rise
DDR5 RAM has seen by far the most significant price increase. The modules in my sample cost, on average, 352 per cent more than they did a year ago – or 4.5 times as much. That roughly matches up with figures from Germany (website in German). According to Tom’s Hardware, the situation in the US is even more extreme. Volume discounts typically secured for larger capacities has gone, with some large kits even commanding a higher per-gigabyte price.
The DDR4 RAM hasn’t surged in price quite as dramatically. Its kits «only» cost 2.5 times as much as they did at the end of August 2025. The price of SSDs has soared by 121 per cent, while HDD prices have gone up 94 per cent. As long as large tech companies continue to pay exorbitant prices for memory manufacturers’ production capacity, there’ll be no respite in sight.
The three major manufacturers – Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron – are shifting their production towards HBM and server DRAM because of their higher margin-generating potential. SK Hynix anticipates that standard DRAM will become even more expensive by the end of 2027 (article in German). New production facilities that’d help alleviate the shortage won’t become operational until 2028 at the earliest.
Large kits are becoming unaffordable
If you look at the absolute prices, you realise just how much of a luxury item a home-built PC with plenty of RAM has become. For a 64-gigabyte DDR5 running at 6,000 MT/s, you’ll shell out over 1,100 francs. A year ago, it was still roughly 200 francs.
Fewer and fewer people are willing and able to afford this. After skyrocketing at the end of last year, the average sales price of DDR5 RAM has fallen slightly again. Not because RAM costs less per gigabyte, but because customers are switching to smaller kits. Which makes sense. For most games, 32 GB does the job. That’s why paying extra for 64 GB is only worth it in special cases, such as professional content creation or specialised workloads.
Computer science professor Daniel Lemire has pointed out the historic significance of the price surge. According to his analysis, current average DDR5 prices have basically reached 2007 DDR2 price levels. In just a few quarters, a price drop lasting a steady two decades has been reversed.
SSDs and HDDs: price difference per terabyte is growing
External storage hasn’t undergone the same price shocks as RAM. With these products, the increase was spread out over about four months. Prices have stayed relatively stable since the end of March, though they’re still higher than ever. A year ago, a 2 TB SSD for a gaming PC cost 130 francs. Today it fetches nearly 300 francs. If you want to build your own NAS and need traditional HDDs for it, you’ll end up paying about twice as much compared to last year.
Manufacturers such as Western Digital and Kioxia have deliberately scaled back production of consumer products following the price lows of 2023/24 and are prioritising high-margin enterprise SSDs. That means, for typical users, SSDs are still necessary for operating systems and programs, but too expensive for data archiving. For that, you’re better off using traditional hard drives. As a result of the price increases, the difference per terabyte has doubled in absolute terms.
My fingerprint often changes so drastically that my MacBook doesn't recognise it anymore. The reason? If I'm not clinging to a monitor or camera, I'm probably clinging to a rockface by the tips of my fingers.
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