Stores in Japan begin to limit sales of GPUs, fearing low stocks

This week we had the first rumors predicting a rise in the price of GPUs at the beginning of next year, due to inflation in memory values ​​that has already affected several other components and devices. Now, we have news that stores in Japan are already worried about the amount of their stocks for next year.

The website ITMedia reports that at least one of Japan’s largest hardware stores has already started to ration the amount of certain GPUs that customers can purchase. Tsukumo eX, in Akihabara, only allows the purchase of one card per person, in the case of models with 16GB of memory or more.

The rule applies to models starting from the RTX 5060 Ti and the Radeon RX 9000. “Cards equipped with high-capacity memory have become very difficult to obtain. We still have stock at the moment, but we are in a situation where we don’t know when the next shipment will arrive – or if it will arrive at all”, declared the store.

Memory crisis is reaching GPUs

Due to the way the contract and stock of GPUs between NVIDIA and AMD with AIB companies works, video cards managed to pass the fourth quarter of 2025 with some price and supply stability, while almost every other electronic product is already suffering from the memory crisis.

However, as expected, this “protection” is coming to an end. With the year 2026 not expected to see any improvement in the current situation, it is most likely that we will see video cards increasingly expensive and more difficult to buy.

AMD models are expected to see a first increase in January, with NVIDIA following in February.

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And it’s not just the issue of price and availability that could suffer from the lack of memories for the commercial segment. There are already predictions of new products being postponed to wait for a little more stability in the market. As companies pursue AI gains, consumers will remain the lowest priority.

Via: Tom’s Hardware