Playing video games is rapidly becoming a much more expensive hobby than it was just a few years ago, as AI-driven memory shortages and economic instability fuel rising hardware prices, and the CEO of a leading RAM producer says things are unlikely to ease up until 2028, at the earliest.
The affordability crisis putting pressure on manufacturers to hike prices is the result of a perfect storm in which inflation, tariffs implemented by the US government, and memory shortages caused by the rapid development of AI data centers collide.
This year alone, Nintendo Switch 2 prices shot up by $50, a PlayStation price hike brought the premium PS5 Pro all the way up to $900, Valve increased the price of entry to the Steam Machine lineup to $1049, and just today, Microsoft raised Xbox prices up $100-$150 depending on the model. Meanwhile, building your own gaming machine via assembling PC components isn't a remotely affordable alternative, as RAM in particular remains exorbitantly pricey.
I genuinely wish I had more optimistic news to share on this front, and I'm sure eventually things will settle down, but according to Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra, that day won't be for many months.
"We expect tight conditions to persist beyond calendar 2027 as a result of AI-driven demand across all segments coupled with structural supply constraints," Mehrotra told investors in the company's Q3 earnings report (via IGN).
"Even as we expect industry supply to improve gradually in 2028, we currently do not have line of sight as to when memory supply will be able to catch up with increasing demand," he added.
Naturally, the implications for the price of future generations of gaming consoles, specifically the PS6 and Xbox Project Helix, are dire. Analysts have predicted the next-gen consoles to debut with 50% higher price tags than their current-gen counterparts, and $1000 base models aren't out of the question.
That said, Microsoft and Sony could decide to wait out the RAMpocalypse and simply delay the new consoles until the component shortages and related price elevations are in the rear-view. That could potentially push the next generation of consoles into the 2030s, with reports indicating Sony is already considering an internal delay.
