Regular HDDs have increased in price by an average of 50% due to the crisis.

Consumer HDD Prices Have Increased by an Average of 50% Due to Crisis

Prices for consumer-class hard drives have risen sharply in recent months. Research conducted by ComputerBase in Europe and Tom's Hardware in the USA shows that the cost of popular models from Seagate, Western Digital, and Toshiba has increased by an average of 46% over four months, with some models seeing increases of 60-66%.

For example, the 4-terabyte version of the Seagate IronWolf in the USA now costs around $99, whereas at the beginning of 2023 it could be purchased for $70. The price of the 24 TB BarraCuda model jumped from approximately $239 during sales to $499 on Amazon.

The main reason for the increase is the boom in the artificial intelligence market. Manufacturers are reorienting their production capacities towards high-capacity enterprise drives for data centers, which reduces supply and increases prices for consumer models. This trend has affected almost all key components for PC assembly: RAM, SSDs, hard drives, and graphics cards.