Smartphones expected to become even worse or 30% more expensive: Nothing CEO Carl Pei warns of the consequences of the DRAM crisis

Nothing founder Carl Pei has published a lengthy post on social network X, titled "Why Your Next Smartphone Will Cost More". In it, Pei hints at a bleak future for the smartphone market, suggesting that the successor to the Nothing Phone (3), like many other smartphones launching this year, will either be significantly more expensive or have features removed.

According to Carl Pei, the smartphone industry has relied on the gradual decrease of component prices (such as displays, RAM, and flash storage) over the past 15 years, allowing companies to release new models with improved features but virtually unchanged prices each year. This trend has now come to an end, as the DRAM crisis has caused RAM and NAND costs to skyrocket in recent months, with no improvement expected until 2028.

The Nothing CEO anticipates that RAM modules for high-end smartphones, which cost $20 last year, will cost well over $100 by the end of 2026. This will force smartphone manufacturers to either increase the prices of new models by more than 30% in some cases, or cut costs elsewhere to maintain the price of the previous model. Carl Pei has already confirmed that the next Nothing Phones, expected to launch in the first quarter, will be more expensive than their predecessors. In the entry and mid-tier segments, the specs race is over for now, he concludes.