TrendForce Raises Its Q4 DRAM Outlook and Forecasts Enterprise SSD Prices Up 23 to 28%

DRAM negotiations move into a new quarter

TrendForce's September 23 public bulletin raises its 4Q26 DRAM contract-price outlook. It cites tight supply, continued cloud-provider buying and capacity directed toward HBM and server DRAM. Long-term agreements also reduce the supply available for negotiation.

The summary says PC and server products lead the gains, while mobile and consumer products face a high price base. Ask for allocation and quote validity by product family. A single escalation assumption for the whole memory budget would hide those differences.

Enterprise SSDs carry the larger NAND forecast

The public contents of TrendForce's September 24 forecast put enterprise SSD contract-price growth at 23 to 28% quarter over quarter, against 15 to 20% for NAND Flash overall. Both refer to the fourth quarter of 2026.

Those are forecasts for market segments. Compare a supplier's proposed increase with the applicable segment, then ask for its own price basis and delivery commitment. We used the public summary and contents; the paid report was not available to us.

QLC demand needs its own discussion

In its September 21 release, TrendForce says US cloud providers have increased enterprise SSD demand forecasts and that QLC products are contributing to growth alongside TLC. TrendForce links demand to agentic AI retrieval and caching, and to KV cache offloading in China.

For your next negotiation, separate enterprise drives by interface, density, endurance and approved configuration. Have engineering review any suggested architecture change before procurement counts the alternate as supply.

Use the forecast to ask better questions

Request a line-by-line comparison of current price, proposed price, committed quantity and shipment window. Put uncommitted quantities in a separate column so an attractive quote doesn't get counted as build coverage.

For any supplier citing AI demand, ask which of your products is affected and whether the constraint is a chip allocation, a finished drive or a delivery slot. Keep that answer with the purchase decision.