DRAM Price-Fixing Lawsuit: Will RAM Prices Drop?

Three companies make nearly all of the memory inside PCs, phones and servers. Now a U.S. federal judge says buyers can keep pressing their claim that those companies worked together to restrict supply. On November 14, 2026, Judge Noël Wise of the Northern District of California denied a joint motion by Samsung, SK hynix and Micron to dismiss a proposed DRAM price-fixing lawsuit, according to LitNews and IntelWire.

The key caveat: this ruling proves nothing yet. At this stage, the court has to accept the complaint's allegations as true. No conspiracy has been established and no company has been found liable.

What is the DRAM price-fixing lawsuit about?

The case, Garciaguirre v. Samsung Electronics (No. 5:26-cv-06345-NW), was filed on June 25, 2026, by 17 consumers and small businesses from five states. It targets conventional DRAM, the standardized memory used in desktop and laptop PCs, including DDR5 modules.

The complaint alleges that the three makers cut production starting in late 2022, then shifted capacity toward HBM, the high-bandwidth memory used in AI accelerators, which it says needs about three to four times the wafer area per gigabyte of DDR5. It also points to DDR4 wind-downs announced between April and June 2025, and to Micron's December 3, 2025 announcement that it would close Crucial, its consumer memory brand.

According to the complaint, the three companies held more than 91% of global DRAM revenue in the third quarter of 2025, and conventional DRAM prices rose 171.8% in one year and about 697% over 18 months. Those are the plaintiffs' figures, not findings by the court.

What did the judge actually decide?

Judge Wise found the complaint plausibly alleges an agreement in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act. The companies argued the case repeated "DRAM II," an earlier suit over a 2016–2018 supply squeeze whose dismissal the Ninth Circuit affirmed in 2022. "The Court finds that it is not," she wrote, as quoted by LitNews.

She wrote that the move to HBM by itself "might not be sufficient." What tipped the balance at this stage was the related conduct alleged in the complaint: long-term HBM contracts, refusals of long-term conventional DRAM deals, delayed or halted fabs, no expansion despite record prices, and near-identical customer vetting adopted in January 2026. She gave no weight to investor talk of "supply discipline," to executives meeting at industry conferences, or to the three-company market structure on its own.

Have Samsung, SK hynix and Micron responded?

We found no public statement from any of the three companies about the ruling in the coverage we reviewed. In court, they argued the case was a rerun of DRAM II, and IntelWire notes that the manufacturers attribute the shortage to AI demand and to HBM absorbing capacity. On X, the account @YavarB, which describes filing the complaint on behalf of overcharged DRAM purchasers, posted that the court denied the three companies' motions to dismiss.

The companies' answers are due December 7, 2026, and the initial case management conference is set for January 12, 2027.

Will the lawsuit lower RAM prices?

Not soon. IntelWire points out that the ruling changes no announced capacity plan today. The next phase is discovery, where plaintiffs can seek internal documents on capacity and pricing. Newzino lays out the possible paths from here: a settlement, a failed bid for class certification, or summary judgment and trial, with a resolution window running into 2029.

This is not new territory for the memory market. In the 1998–2002 DRAM cartel case prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice, Samsung paid a US$300 million criminal fine and Hynix paid US$185 million, while Micron received immunity for cooperating, according to Newzino.

Should you buy RAM now or wait?

Don't plan a build around this lawsuit. Any effect on prices would come through a settlement or a court order that is months, likely years, away, and the makers still point to AI demand as the main driver. If you need a PC now, buy the capacity your games and apps actually use instead of paying today's prices for memory you will not touch.

A complete gaming PC that already includes memory, or one of our refurbished PCs, can be simpler than hunting for a standalone kit. If your current system already has enough RAM, putting your budget into one of our graphics cards usually does more for gaming performance. If your PC still does the job, waiting costs you nothing, but no date on the court calendar promises cheaper memory.

FAQ

Did the court find that Samsung, SK hynix and Micron fixed prices?

No. The judge only ruled that the claims are plausible enough to proceed. The allegations have not been proven.

Can I join the DRAM class action?

It is still a proposed class action. No class has been certified, so there is no claims process for buyers at this stage.

When is the next step in the case?

The companies must answer the complaint by December 7, 2026. The initial case management conference is set for January 12, 2027.

Does the lawsuit cover DDR5?

Yes. The complaint concerns conventional DRAM, including DDR5 modules for computers, and also cites the wind-down of DDR4.

Sources: LitNews, IntelWire, Newzino and a post on X by @YavarB.