Samsung may end SATA SSD production soon

According to the YouTube channel Moore’s Law Is Dead, in January 2026, Samsung will announce that it will end the production of SATA SSDs at some point in the next couple of years. Along with that, it will also halt the sales of these drives to new people (customers who don’t already have a contract with Samsung that it needs to fulfil).

The brand will, however, continue the production of PCIe SSDs, such as the 990 Pro, 990 Evo, 980 Pro, 980, and 970 Evo Plus. Reportedly, the company is exiting the SATA SSD business as it has lower profits compared to PCIe NVMe SSDs. Some of the SATA SSDs that Samsung sells include the 870 Evo, 870 Qvo, and 860 Evo.

Recently, Micron, another major player in the SSD market, announced that it will be exiting the consumer business. It will most likely impact the supply of SSDs and increase the prices. With Samsung ending SATA SSD sales, there will be an even greater impact on the supply of these drives, jacking up their prices even further.

Recently, there has been a sharp rise in the demand for AI-powered tools, especially chatbots like ChatGPT. These tools run on AI accelerators located in server farms, which require a large amount of high-bandwidth memory (HBM). As such, the demand for memory has increased rapidly. AI accelerator brands, such as Nvidia, are ready to pay top dollars to secure HBM chips. With that, memory brands are focusing more on supplying products to companies rather than selling products to retail consumers.

The whole phenomenon has impacted the supply of memory (and storage) products and increased their prices. It has affected the smartphone market as well. With rising memory prices, mobile phone manufacturers are increasing the prices of their devices. For example, Samsung is expected to increase the price of its Galaxy A series phones by up to INR 2,000 in India in the near future. The shortage of memory chips is expected to continue till 2028. If you were planning to buy SATA SSDs, now is the time to do so.