Anyone hoping to upgrade theirs PC may be in for a rough ride, as prices for Nvidia 5090 GPUs have skyrocketed. RTX 50 series graphics cards have never been cheap, but even their sky-high retail prices look affordable compared to where they're headed now amid the global RAM shortage. It's a tough time for PC gaming, and it doesn't look like things are going to let up anytime soon.
Nvidia unveiled the 50 series early last year, and as you'd expect from the fastest consumer GPU on the market, the most powerful of the bunch came with an eye-watering price tag. The RTX 5090 has an MSRP of $1,999, making this one component about the same price as two PlayStation 5 consoles. That's a lot of money, but it gives those who can buy a full 32GB of DDR7 VRAM. Unfortunately, that memory is now facing a global supply constraint, so things are quickly getting even more expensive.
The RAM shortage is about to get much worse as Micron pulls consumers away for AI
Micron is ending its popular Crucial brand of consumer PC products as the company turns its attention to AI amid an ongoing RAM price hike.
Retailers are listing RTX 5090 GPUs for over $3,000
As discovered by VideoCardz, the cheapest 5090 GPUs currently listed at Nvidia's select retailers are around $2,500, roughly 25% above MSRP. However, many of these options are either out of stock or only available for pickup at a physical location. Most of the listings, especially those available for shipping, now start around $3,000, and some are closer to $4,000. The price hike comes after rumors that Nvidia may reduce 50-series GPU production to preserve dwindling DDR7 supplies. Nvidia still hasn't confirmed whether they're actually implementing such a strategy, but concerns about how the RAM shortage could affect availability have already prompted retailers to raise prices in anticipation.
Nvidia isn't the only company showing massive price increases amid the ongoing RAM crisis. The trend began in late 2025, when consumer-grade RAM kits tripled in price after SK Hynix and Samsung agreed to divert much of their memory production to AI data centers. Things got worse when Micron stopped doing consumer memory altogether, and as the laws of supply and demand took hold, things inevitably tightened up for manufacturers. Now, companies like Nvidia, which typically don't run their own semiconductor factories but buy components like RAM from outside suppliers, face supply bottlenecks and higher production costs, ultimately leading to higher end-user prices.
While it didn't take long for prices to jump, it will most likely take a while for the market to cool off. As more people rush to buy GPUs and other PC components, it will further limit the available supply. On the production side, it will also take a long time for manufacturers to catch up with current demand, as they need to build new specialized facilities to create more RAM. These barriers are why Micron estimates the RAM crisis will last beyond 2026, and if AI-driven demand increases even more, it could stretch things out even further. Of course, it's impossible to predict exactly how things will look in the future, but things aren't looking good for PC gamers at the moment.
Depending on how things continue from here, PC gamers may not be alone in feeling the effects of the RAM shortage. Sony and Xbox are rumored to be delaying their next-gen consoles in order to release them at a lower price rather than having to ask for more to cover higher production costs. These rumors are unconfirmed at the moment, as are any responses from Nvidia, but with the market looking as volatile as it is, it's not necessarily something that's off the table. Currently, PC gaming isn't very affordable, and it might not be for a while.
Source: VideoCardz
