Due to the ongoing RAM and SSD shortages, many are refraining from building a PC altogether and this can be seen in the latest sales data.
German Retailer Mindfactory Sales Slow Down Dramatically Amid Ongoing Market Volatility; CPU and Motherboard Sales Dwindle Significantly Compared to Last Year
The ongoing DRAM and SSD shortages have contributed to additional prices hikes for components and devices like graphics cards, pre-built PCs, laptops, and many consumer electronics. In some regions CPUs have also been affected, but they still remain one of the few core components that are still selling on usual rates. Despite that, there is a striking change in the sales for CPUs as well as other PC components as higher RAM and SSD prices have made building a PC unfeasible.
As per the latest sales data on a popular German retailer, Mindfactory, we can see that the CPU sales are barely crossing 1,000 units in two weeks, which is significantly lower than compared to the sales data from last year. AMD has sold only 860 units in total in the last two weeks, while Intel ended up with just 140. AMD is still leading the sales charts, but the low sales are concerning. When compared to January 2025 sales stats, the shipments are nearly 25X lower. Even when we consider a bad month for CPU sales like July 2025, the CPU sales were still over 13,000 units in a week.
Not just Mindfactory, but Amazon CPU sales have also dwindled drastically, and if you compare the data by @TechEpiphanyYT, you will see a striking difference. After analyzing the CPU sales data for 2026, we are seeing a sharp drop in sales almost every week. For instance, in the second week of February, the total CPU shipments were nearly 1,500 (Mindfactory), and the sales have already dropped by 50% when we take the combined sales stats of the last two weeks.
Similarly, motherboard sales have dropped faster than ever. From over 3,000-5,000 shipments in a single week in 2024, the numbers have dropped to just over 1,000 as of the last week of March. @TechEpiphanyYT says that after 10 years of tracking, he has never seen such a "steep" decline in sales. It all started with the "AI Slop" that made it incredibly difficult to build PCs now, and isn't showing any signs of slowdown.
About the author: Sarfraz Khan is a hardware reporter with a focus on PC components and the builder community. With years of experience writing about PC hardware and laptops, his work has been featured on several reputable technology publications. Sarfraz's hands-on experience is demonstrated through his first-person accounts of using and comparing different hardware configurations, providing practical and relatable insights for everyday users. His technical analysis is respected by peers in the enthusiast community and has been cited by specialized hardware sites such as Germany's Igor's Lab.
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