- Apple CEO warns of “significantly higher memory costs”
- Starting in June, we’re told the cost of RAM will “have an increasing impact” on Apple Macs
- Samsung has also warned of the memory crisis, and that “a significant shortage” will continue until at least 2027.
Apple is warning about the impact of increasingly expensive RAM on its products, and a major memory chip maker has also contributed to the gloomy news when it comes to RAM supply and pricing.
MacRumors reports that Apple just received its quarterly earnings call and CEO Tim Cook noted that memory costs increased during the March quarter (second quarter of its fiscal year). Additionally, Cook said that in the next quarter (June), Apple anticipates “significantly higher memory costs” and that starting in June 2026, the cost of RAM will “drive an increasing impact” on Apple products.
Sounds sinister, doesn’t it? Part of the problem is that the significant stock of RAM that Apple had built up (paid for in the past when prices were still at more normal levels) is starting to run out, so naturally something will have to give in terms of pricing.
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We don’t know exactly what, and all the CEO would be willing to say is that Apple is exploring a “range of options” to address potential price increases due to having to pay more (a lot more, no doubt) for RAM.
9 to 5 Mac also chimed in to note that Cook also commented on stock issues with two of Apple’s Macs that have been seen lately. The CEO said: “On Mac mini and Mac Studio, they are both incredible platforms for AI and agent tools, and customer recognition of this is happening faster than we had predicted, so we saw higher-than-expected demand.”
This is due to the popularity of running local AI on a device that has a lot of memory, such as the more robust configurations of those Macs (driven by the success of the OpenClaw AI agent).
Cook also noted that demand for the new MacBook Neo has been “off the charts,” and that for all of these Macs, it may take a few months for Apple to address the supply shortfall.
Elsewhere aside from Apple, Tom’s Hardware noted that Samsung, one of the big memory chip makers, just released its own earnings report, and executive vice president Kim Jaejune warned that “a significant shortage” in its memory products is expected to persist at least through 2027 (that is, until 2028). We’re told demand fill rates are now at historic lows, meaning Samsung is struggling to meet the level of demand like never before.
Analysis: treacherous waters ahead
Samsung isn’t the only one sounding the memory alarm bells, because one of the other big three chipmakers in this space, SK Hynix, warned in March that the RAM crisis is going to last a long time, possibly making its effects felt until 2030. Whichever way you look at it, there are warnings that the RAM crisis will continue until 2028 or maybe longer. Only the third major memory maker, Micron, has yet to issue any notice.
Apple’s plight obviously reinforces this message, and it will be interesting to see what kind of “options” Tim Cook is considering in terms of combating the lack of RAM supply and avoiding having to increase the prices of its Macs. Clearly, Apple has a lot of clout to offer in terms of getting the best prices from the supply chain, but at this point I imagine there is little room for maneuver in contract negotiations, even for the world’s tech giants.
Then again, having established the MacBook Neo’s stagnation as a truly affordable laptop, Apple can’t exactly back down and raise prices on that particular offering, so it looks like these could be tricky waters to navigate for Captain Cook – or more specifically, Captain Ternus, as he soon will be. It’s an interesting time to take over Apple, that’s for sure.
Some Redditors are certainly preparing for the worst: Mac price hikes. As the top-voted comment on this thread on the Apple subreddit said: “Oh come on, we all know how Apple plans to ‘deal with the problem’. No one needs the CEO to explain the price hikes Apple is going to make in the not-too-distant future.”
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