Your Next Laptop Got More Expensive

Gartner says memory chip prices have more than doubled in twelve months, pushed up by data centre demand, and that the increase is working its way through storage, servers, networking and ordinary computers. It expects the pressure to last through 2027. Your next quote is not going to look like your last one.

On October 21 the research firm Gartner published its forecast for technology spending next year. Buried in it is one sentence that matters more to a thirty-person business than the headline number does. Memory chip prices have more than doubled in twelve months, and the increase is spreading into the price of everything that contains memory. Which is everything. Our interest here, and there are two, both awkward. When hardware prices rise, our invoices rise with them — we buy the equipment and pass the cost on. And we have an obvious commercial reason to tell you to buy sooner rather than later, which is exactly the advice this story appears to support. Weigh what follows accordingly. The technical part — you can skip this box "Gartner Forecasts Worldwide IT Spending to Grow 15% in 2027, Totaling $7.35 Trillion," Gartner press release dated October 21, 2026, issued through BusinessWire from Orlando, Florida. Gartner's own website returned an error to us, so the release was read in full from a syndicated copy carrying the complete text. The release forecasts overall worldwide technology spending of $6,391 billion in 2026, growing 14.5%, and $7,352 billion in 2027, growing 15.0%. Within that, the Devices segment — which is where ordinary computers sit — is forecast at $847 billion in 2026, growing 7.2%, and $916 billion in 2027, growing 8.1%. On prices the release says: "hardware markets are experiencing growing pressure from memory-related inflation," and "Over the past 12 months, demand from data center systems has driven memory prices to more than double, with cost increases cascading throughout storage, server, networking, PC and device supply chains." John-David Lovelock, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner, is quoted: "This 'memflation' effect is expected to persist through 2027 before hardware pricing begins to stabilize," and "While higher average selling prices continue to support spending growth, the resulting pressure on affordability is expected to suppress end-user demand throughout the forecast horizon." "Memflation" is Gartner's own coinage, not ours. The release says nothing at all about small or mid-sized businesses , which is worth knowing before anyone quotes it at you as though it did. It also gives no buying advice; everything below in the "what to do" section is ours. What that actually means Memory is the chips a computer uses to hold whatever it is working on right now. Separate from storage, where files live permanently, though the price rise has reached both. It costs roughly twice what it did a year ago , and the reason has nothing to do with you. Companies building enormous data centres are buying memory in volumes that moved the whole market. That cost does not stay in data centres. Gartner's own word is "cascading" — into storage, servers, network equipment, and the computers on your desks. It is expected to last about another year. Gartner's forecast is that prices stabilise after 2027. A forecast, not a promise. The part that is actually good news Nothing has broken and nothing needs fixing. This is a price movement, which is the most manageable kind of problem a business gets — it has a number, a timeframe, and it arrives with notice. A firm that re-prices its 2027 plan in November is in a different position from one that discovers this in March with a quote it cannot approve. The caveat, which is a check rather than a fear A global forecast is not a quote for your office. Prices for the machines you actually buy may move more than this, or less, or not at all before your renewal. So the check is simple: ask for today's price, and ask how long it stands. What to do before January Re-price anything already planned for 2027. If there is a refresh in next year's budget costed in 2025 numbers, it is wrong now. Ask how long a quote is good for. In a rising market this is a real question with a real answer, and it is one most people never ask. Ask what waiting actually costs , against what replacing early costs. Sometimes keeping a machine another year is now the better trade, which is not advice that makes us money. Do not panic-buy on a forecast. It is one firm's view of a global market, published by a company that sells research. If we handle your equipment, ask us for current pricing in writing rather than a verbal figure. That is a reasonable thing to expect and it protects you from us as much as from the market.