PCs under $500 to "disappear by 2028" predicts analyst. Apparently water's wet, too.

In a piece of in-depth analysis that will have very few of us reeling, tech analyst firm Gartner has revealed that it believes "the sub-$500 entry-level PC segment will disappear by 2028," based on its latest research. This milestone in the steady rise in the cost of PCs is because of the 130% increase in the combined cost of memory and SSDs, and which will result an overall 17% increase in PC prices compared to 2025.

Gartner doesn't single out AI as the reason for these increased component prices, or at least it doesn't in the overview of this report, but instead merely cites "soaring memory costs" and the fact that the net effect of these price increases and reduced supply will be a 10.4% drop in PC shipments this year. As if generally high GPU prices weren't already making the best gaming PCs very expensive, memory and SSDs are now piling on the pain.

"This is the steepest contraction in device shipments witnessed in over a decade. Higher prices will narrow the range of devices available, prompting buyers to hold on to devices for longer, fundamentally altering upgrade cycles," Ranjit Atwal, Sr Director Analyst at Gartner, explains in the report.

Elaborating on the last point there, Atwal predicts that these market pressures will mean PC owners will hold on to their systems for longer than ever, increasing average PC lifetime by 15% for business buyers and 20% for consumers by the end of 2026. These delayed upgrades "will further raise concerns over increased security vulnerabilities," the report continues.

There is some good news in this report, though, as Atwal also predicts that "rising AI PC prices will delay the projected 50% market penetration of AI PCs until 2028." If only Microsoft would delay its own tiresome AI-pushing ambitions til at least then as well.

Perhaps the biggest takeaway from this report is that it suggests high RAM and SSD prices are here to stay for longer than other sources had previously predicted. Some other reports have suggested that as soon as the middle of this year, the market could settle back down a bit, but seemingly that won't be the case.

It's worth bearing in mind that at least some of this cost increase will also just be natural inflation. Everything has become more expensive in the last few years, and PC parts overall haven't been exempt. As such, it was inevitable that PCs would at some point push beyond the $500 mark. It's just that only a few years ago, we might have hoped that this future was a long way away.

Thankfully, while it's always tempting to upgrade and keep up with current gaming PC trends, there are still plenty of games that won't need you to splash the cash any time soon. The Resident Evil Requiem system requirements, for instance, are plenty modest, as are the Marathon system requirements. Plus, plenty of upcoming indie games, such as Super Meat Boy 3D, have even lower needs.