News

According to industry reports, the global shortage of memory and flash storage chips has intensified, creating a critical supply challenge for Intel and AMD CPUs and putting PC manufacturers under growing pressure. Major companies such as HP and Dell have reportedly indicated that current processor deliveries are insufficient to meet demand, with the situation worsening compared to previous months.

This shortage has triggered price increases, with costs rising an average of 10%–15% or more, and has extended lead times from a few weeks to as long as six months. Intel and AMD have informed customers that CPU prices across all product lines will increase in March and April.

A server manufacturer executive noted, “CPU delivery times used to average 1–2 weeks, but now the waiting period has extended to 8–12 weeks.” Another industry insider warned that lead times could reach up to six months. Analysts predict that by the second quarter of 2026, supply constraints could intensify further, and PC manufacturers cannot resolve the shortage solely through higher spending. “The CPU shortage is becoming as severe as the memory chip shortage,” one executive said.

Signs of this trend emerged in early February, when server CPUs from Intel and AMD already faced supply constraints in China. Both companies confirmed surging CPU demand in their quarterly earnings reports, with AMD CEO Lisa Su noting business exceeded expectations, and Intel CFO David Zinsner highlighting that CPUs are again in high demand this year.

Similar to current memory and flash shortages, the surge in CPU demand is being driven by AI hyperscale data centers. During the rise of large AI models such as ChatGPT, companies heavily purchased GPUs, creating shortages from 2023 through mid-2025. While GPU supply has normalized, memory and storage shortages have emerged since late 2025. High-paying AI companies have absorbed much of the available capacity, leaving limited inventory for the consumer market. Some manufacturers, including Micron for SSDs and memory, have shifted focus from consumer products to AI and enterprise clients.

Currently, CPU supply is facing similar pressures even before memory and storage availability fully recover. AI workloads rely heavily on GPUs, but other system components depend on CPUs, and the growing adoption of smaller AI models and intelligent agents is driving further demand for server processors.

For the general-purpose server market, this is a challenging outlook. Analysts estimate that 2026 demand for general server CPUs could grow nearly 15%, while Intel’s capacity expansion is expected to be single-digit percentage growth. AMD, which lacks its own fabrication facilities, must compete with other chipmakers, including NVIDIA and Google, for TSMC and Samsung wafer capacity.

However, this shortage presents an opportunity for Arm-based processors to gain market share, particularly in mainstream laptops. While gamers and specialized application users tend to prefer x86 processors, Arm-based devices have gradually entered the market since Microsoft’s 2024 push with Copilot+ PCs featuring Snapdragon processors. Qualcomm is actively improving the Arm-based Windows gaming experience, and NVIDIA’s N1X processor is expected to debut in laptops this year.

These developments pose a significant challenge to x86 dominance, with Intel and AMD working to maintain market share. Yet, if they cannot meet consumer demand, users may increasingly turn to alternative CPU architectures.