Memory Costs Break PC Demand: Shipments Fall 21.2%

Omdia reported on 22 October that global shipments of desktops, notebooks and workstations totalled 58.1 million units in the third quarter of 2026, down 21.2% year on year — the steepest decline since the first quarter of 2023. Counterpoint puts the drop at about 21% and Gartner at 22.4%; the methodologies differ, the direction does not.

Cost is the driver. Ben Yeh, chief analyst at Omdia, notes that DRAM and SSDs have moved from roughly 15% of PC bill-of-materials cost to close to 40%, with those components more than four times more expensive. Repeated price rises by PC makers have not fully offset it. Vendors and their ODM partners began cutting output in the third quarter, while channel partners are still working through inventory built up in the first half.

Pricing itself has not turned. TrendForce spot data for 22 October showed DDR5 16Gb up 0.38% and its eTT grade up 0.70%, DDR4 8Gb up 0.46%, DDR3 4Gb up 0.66%, with DDR4 16Gb flat. The research house said Korean and Taiwanese makers have shifted capacity to server applications, leaving PC DRAM severely short, so OEMs are building inventory while cutting specifications to contain cost.

The outlook is a forecast: Omdia expects shipments to fall 24% year on year in the fourth quarter and a further 7% across 2027.

Passives are tightening too. Murata, Taiyo Yuden and Samsung Electro-Mechanics have all issued price increase notices, with high-capacitance MLCCs for AI servers up 15%–35% at the manufacturer level.

For procurement, lower end-market output does not mean looser supply. Consumer-grade part numbers still need to be planned against long lead times, and as specifications come down, substitute part numbers should be qualified early.

YANGSHIN Technology distributes memory and passive components from JC Semiconductor, Kangying Semiconductor and Youcun Technology, among others.