RAMageddon Will Only Get Worse in 2027, According to Samsung

The entirety of 2026 has been defined by an ongoing RAM crisis, causing price increases on everything from the PS5 to the Steam Machine. According to Samsung’s latest earnings report, this trend is only going to get worse over the next year.

In its Q3 2026 earnings call, it was shared that Samsung's semiconductor segment, which includes its memory business, made the company 147.1 trillion Korean Won, of which 106.5 trillion is profit. This figure makes up for 72% of all of Samsung’s revenue in the last quarter. According to Samsung, these numbers were possible by prioritizing the manufacturing of HBM4 memory used in AI datacenters.

Looking forward, Samsung expects the memory market to tighten even more in 2027, with the company claiming "Surging AI-driven demand likely to further tighten supply shortages compared with CY26," when discussing the memory business next year. AI demand is so strong that Samsung doesn't even mention consumer-grade DDR5 memory, and is instead focused entirely on building a "stable sales base through long-term contracts and ensure timely readiness of new products tailored to requirements for AI applications."

This earnings report comes just a couple months after a Digitimes report suggested that all memory capacity for 2027 had already been sold through. According to Samsung's earnings, this prediction seems accurate, even if the company is working to expand manufacturing to make more RAM for AI data centers. Samsung is one of just three major memory manufacturers in the world right now, and all three have prioritized manufacturing high-capacity server-grade memory for AI datacenters rather than anything that you'd find in a gaming PC.

Signs of the worsening crisis are visible elsewhere: A couple of weeks ago, the PS5 Pro sold out, causing the price of used consoles to skyrocket. Furthermore, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma claimed that demand is outstripping supply for consoles, even if the Xbox Series X and Series S are still widely available right now.