{"slug": "historical-memory-prices-1960-2026", "title": "Historical memory prices 1960-2026", "summary": "A new interactive dataset tracking historical memory and storage prices from 1960 to 2026 shows the lowest retail $/GB for DRAM, NAND flash, and HBM, with breakdowns by generation and accelerator cost estimates from Epoch AI. The data, compiled by David Shim at Stanford, reveals price trends and component cost shares for AI accelerators from Nvidia, AMD, Google, and Amazon.", "body_md": "Historic and current **memory and storage prices**, collected in the spirit of\nJohn C. McCallum's classic memory-price dataset — interactive, with the raw data downloadable.\nHover for details, click the legend to toggle series, drag or use the slider to zoom, and use the\ncamera icon to export an image.\n\n## Price per gigabyte over time\n\nHistorical lowest $/GB on a log scale — one line per memory type:\n\n**DRAM**,** NAND flash**, and** HBM**.## DRAM price by generation\n\nThe DRAM line above, broken out by generation across the full history —\nPre-DDR (SDRAM/core), DDR, DDR2, DDR3, DDR4, DDR5. (Generation is inferred from product\ndescriptions, so older points are approximate.)\n\n## Accelerator cost breakdown\n\nModeled estimates from\n\n**Epoch AI**: quarterly accelerator cost across the four largest AI-accelerator designers —** Nvidia, AMD, Google (TPU) and Amazon (Trainium)**— stacked by component (HBM, logic die, packaging/CoWoS, auxiliary), a** production-volume-weighted average**.## HBM price by generation\n\nBy HBM generation (HBM2e → HBM3 → HBM3e → HBM4). HBM is sold only to accelerator\nmakers on confidential contracts — there is\n\n**no public spot market**— so these are sparse** industry-analyst estimates**(TrendForce / SemiAnalysis), not transaction prices. HBM4 is*projected*(launches Q3 2026). $/TBps is cost per unit of memory bandwidth (stack price ÷ per-stack bandwidth).## Methodology, sources and caveats\n\n### Sources and method\n\n| Category | What we track | Source and method | Reliability |\n|---|---|---|---|\n| DRAM $/GB | cheapest retail $/GB, overall and by generation (DDR3/DDR4/DDR5) | Deep history (1957–2024): the McCallum memory-price dataset\n(\nMid-2024 onward: the cheapest new\nconsumer DIMM each month from\n|\nReference + live |\n| NAND $/GB | cheapest retail SSD $/GB, 2010–present | 2016 onward: the cheapest consumer NVMe SSD each month\nfrom\n2010–2016: four approximate pre-NVMe\nanchor points (no McCallum-equivalent flash dataset exists). |\nLive + approximate |\n| HBM spend and cost breakdown | quarterly HBM spend ($B) and each component's share (%) of the accelerator bill of materials (HBM, logic, packaging, auxiliary) |\n|\n\n[TrendForce](https://www.trendforce.com)and[SemiAnalysis](https://www.semianalysis.com)(HBM has no public spot market); bandwidth from[JEDEC/Rambus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Bandwidth_Memory). HBM4 is projected.### Caveats\n\n- $/GB is the\n**cheapest retail price in nominal USD**— not contract, average, or inflation-adjusted, and retail lags contract pricing. - The cheapest listing often tracks an\n**end-of-life generation being cleared out**, not the leading edge — the per-generation chart shows this. - These are cheapest\n**listed** prices over time (via Keepa),**not confirmed sales**. For the SSD data, obvious posting errors are removed — any month a drive is listed** more than 60% below its own typical price**(e.g. a $130 SSD shown at $4) is dropped. - The DRAM line\n**splices two sources at mid-2024**(McCallum → Keepa); a small step there is expected, since Amazon's cheapest clearance can sit below McCallum's representative low. - HBM figures are\n**modeled estimates**(cost share and spend), not measured prices.\n\n### Updates\n\nDRAM and NAND $/GB refresh **monthly** from Keepa; HBM updates quarterly (Epoch AI).\nThe McCallum backbone and HBM estimates are fixed. The downloadable\n[CSV](/assets/memory-prices/memory-prices.csv) lists every point with its source.\n\n### About\n\nCompiled and maintained by David Shim, Stanford DAM project. Questions or corrections:\n[hsshim@stanford.edu](mailto:hsshim@stanford.edu).", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/historical-memory-prices-1960-2026", "canonical_source": "https://dam.stanford.edu/memory-prices.html", "published_at": "2026-06-28 18:32:53+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-06-28 22:57:52.059548+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-infrastructure", "ai-chips"], "entities": ["Nvidia", "AMD", "Google", "Amazon", "Epoch AI", "TrendForce", "SemiAnalysis", "David Shim"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/historical-memory-prices-1960-2026", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/historical-memory-prices-1960-2026.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/historical-memory-prices-1960-2026.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/historical-memory-prices-1960-2026.jsonld"}}