At the tail-end of last year, we talked about how RAM prices could delay next-generation hardware. Now, according to a report from The Information, we are already starting to see heavy consequences of the RAM shortage and the decisions these massive tech companies are making. The report mentions “two people with direct knowledge of the matter” who stated that Nvidia won’t be releasing any gaming-class graphics cards in 2026.
This directly contradicts the expectations that PC gaming enthusiasts had last year. Many people expected to see the Super versions of various RTX 50-series cards. When that didn’t happen, people just expected Nvidia to wait for the eventual RTX 60-series. In reality, it looks like neither is happening.
Is This Really A Surprise?
For those keeping up with the whole RAM situation and current PC-gaming market, this news is painful, but not exactly unexpected. By market capitalization, Nvidia is the largest company in the world, valued at close to a $5 trillion market cap. They didn’t reach that status by just selling RTX graphics cards to gamers; in fact, it’s just a drop in the bucket compared to their AI customers.
The reason we’re likely not going to see new graphics cards any time soon is due to Nvidia’s shifting focus. RAM is a hot commodity these days, and AI data centers need it by the boatload. It’s much easier for Nvidia to sell a bunch of AI chips to Microsoft, Amazon (AWS), OpenAI, Meta, etc.
The report from The Information suggests that production for the RTX 60-series card has been pushed beyond 2027. If this is true, we might not see any new gaming graphics cards from Nvidia until 2028. The same report also points out that the DRAM shortage will likely be a smaller problem during 2027, but we’ll have to see.
For now, the gaming market certainly looks very bleak hardware-wise. Hopefully, Intel has something up its sleeve with its upcoming “Celestial” graphics cards. If you need a graphics card right now, though, get your hands on anything you can get that meets your bare minimum performance specs at a reasonable price.
