Cheap 1TB SSDs costing under $50 are now a thing of the past, according to Sunsuke Nakato, managing director of Kioxia’s memory business. It seems nothing is safe from the effects of AI investment, as the price of solid-state drives has skyrocketed in recent months. Worse still, NAND shortages like DRAM are unlikely to improve anytime soon, with Nakato claiming these supply chain issues could easily continue into 2027.
According to Digital Daily, Nakato claimed that “the days of cheap 1TB SSDs for around 7,000 yen ($45 USD) are over,” during an interview at the Nine Tree Premier Locus Hotel in Yongsan-gu, Seoul. He also says the company’s NAND supply is already sold out for the year, highlighting that supply chain shortages are affecting both enterprise and consumer storage.
This sentiment echoes prior commentary from other NAND producers, with Phison’s CEO previously stating that shortages could last up to a decade. AI data centres require vast amounts of storage, naturally creating an insatiable demand for SSDs, with HDD prices similarly soaring by 46% in just four months.
As Nakato highlights, it’s “physically impossible” to increase NAND production volume in the wake of this demand, much as manufacturers wish they could, I’m sure. To do so would require new factories, which take years to construct. These same factors are also responsible for the ongoing memory crisis.
Taking a look at some of the most popular solid-state drives on the market makes for difficult reading. At the beginning of December 2025, the WD_Black SN8100 1TB cost a reasonable $139.99 on Amazon. At the time of writing, that same class-leading PCIe Gen 5 drive now costs $319.99. That’s a 129% increase in price in just over a month.
Gen 4 drives aren’t safe from these pressures either. A Samsung 990 Pro 1TB cost $144.99 at the start of the year but now retails for $199.99, marking a lower but still notable 38% increase in cost. Take your pick of an SSD, and you’ll find similar instances across the storefront.
Suffice to say, if you’re planning any kind of upgrade, it seems the best time to buy is as soon as possible. SSD and RAM prices are only likely to tick upward in the coming months, with CPU coolers and PSU prices as well as GPU prices similarly increasing. If you’re rocking an AM4 or DDR4 LGA1700 motherboard, I’d recommend giving Ben’s guide to buying the best DDR4 CPU a read before paying through the nose for a DDR5 system.
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