There is no end in sight to the relentless memory 'chipflation,' with Samsung pursuing aggressive price hikes for server- and mobile-critical LPDDR modules for the third consecutive quarter of the ongoing year, entailing devastating consequences for the wider consumer electronics industry.
Samsung is adopting a particularly aggressive attitude on memory pricing in the new quarter
According to South Korea's ZDNET, Samsung is currently negotiating with commodity DRAM customers with an express goal of hiking its prices by up to 20 percent quarter-over-quarter in Q3.
This comes as Samsung raised its commodity DRAM prices by 90 percent in Q1 2026 over the reference prices for Q4 2025, and then implemented another sequential price hike of between 50 and 60 percent in Q2.
What's more, given the recent "severe bottlenecks," Samsung is gearing up to increase the price of server- and mobile-critical LPDDR by "more than 20 percent" in the new quarter.
Interestingly, the pricing dynamics over at SK hynix are relatively more stable, partly due to the fact that it remains much more reliant on AI-focused HBM, where long-term agreements or LTAs now reign supreme.
Meanwhile, Samsung retains a larger share of the more price-volatile commodity DRAM market, which results in more frequent price changes. Even so, the pace of DRAM price increases is gradually moderating as the share of LTAs progressively increases. But that does not mean that any price relief is imminent, especially as LTAs typically establish a price floor.
Of course, as we noted recently, after undergoing a 3x increase since Q1 2025, LPDDR5X 12GB contract prices were hovering at around $120 towards the tail-end of Q1 and into Q2 2026, and have increased by $68.8 since the start of the year to hit $145 per unit recently.
Elsewhere, Samsung and SK hynix are now undertaking a massive $800 billion venture to expand capacity for memory chips. But with this plan spread over the next 10 years, any immediate capacity-induced price relief remains a forlorn aspiration.
About the author: Writing is my one incontrovertible passion. Over the past six years, he has authored over 2,200 distinct articles on financial and tech-related topics, spanning nearly 1 million words. And he has been a member of Wcctech mobile team since 2025. As an alumnus of the University of Toronto, Rotman Commerce Program, I bring nuance, in-depth knowledge, and a unique perspective to every topic that I cover. When I'm not writing, I'm traveling the world, exploring hidden confectionaries and restaurants as an aspiring food connoisseur.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
