Memory executives now expect the shortage in RAM to continue through 2028, with prices for 2027 supply already being contracted at levels far above 2026.

The cause is the reallocation of manufacturing capacity toward high-bandwidth memory for AI accelerators. Conventional DRAM and NAND have not become scarce through weak demand; they have become scarce because the lines that make them also make the more profitable product.

That distinction matters for everything downstream. Consumer devices, servers and automotive suppliers are all competing for output whose price is being set by a different market entirely.

Forecasts of this kind have been wrong before, because memory cycles are famously violent. But the current investment cycle required to add HBM capacity is long enough that oversupply is not an obvious near-term exit.