Samsung Plans Big NAND Price Jump for Q2 2026
Samsung Electronics is getting ready to roughly double its NAND flash memory prices in the second quarter of 2026. This comes after a big price change in the first quarter where prices already went up by about 100% from late 2025. The main reasons for this are less regular memory being made and a huge increase in artificial intelligence infrastructure spending globally.
The market is shaky right now because AI is changing. As technology goes from data learning to inference where AI models handle real user requests there is a bigger need for a lot of storage space. Big tech companies are really building up AI data centers which is putting a lot of strain on NAND supplies.
Samsung along with other companies like SK Hynix is also making more high bandwidth memory (HBM). This shift has cut down on the supply of regular NAND pushing prices up even more.
It looks like Samsungs price plan will be the norm for the whole industry. Big competitors like Kioxia and SK Hynix will probably raise their prices too. Here is what the market looks like
- Contract Prices The average price for 128Gb MLC NAND recently hit $12.67 a 33.9% increase in just one month
- Annual Growth Prices are up 452.3% compared to this time last year
- Negotiating Power Chip makers have a lot of say in price talks right now leaving companies with few options
The choice to keep prices high is because of what is being made. By making less NAND and focusing on expensive parts like HBM Samsung is in control of a smaller supply which keeps profits up. This should continue through mid 2026 as the need for AI hardware stays strong.
For businesses and data center operators prices doubling in just three months show how unstable the chip market is. As AI inference uses more data NAND is now a key high demand storage item instead of just a regular commodity.
