On September 2nd, market research firm Counterpoint Research released its quarterly global DRAM and HBM market share tracking report, revealing the dramatic shifts in the memory chip market landscape driven by the demand for artificial intelligence computing power.
In the DRAM market, Samsung Electronics maintained its leading position globally in Q2 2026 with a 38% market share, marking its third consecutive quarter of dominance. Looking back at the past five quarters, Samsung's share started at 33% in Q2 2025, rose to 33% in Q3 2025, 36% in Q4 2025, and 38% in Q1 2026, ultimately maintaining a high 38% in Q2 2026, showing a clear upward curve.
SK Hynix's DRAM market share followed the opposite trajectory. The company held the top global market share with 39% in Q2 2025, but subsequently declined quarter by quarter, falling to 33% in Q3 2025, further shrinking to 32% in Q4, dropping to 29% in Q1 2026, and only 25% in Q2 2026. This means that within a year, SK Hynix's DRAM market share went from leading Samsung by 6 percentage points to trailing Samsung by 13 percentage points.
Micron Technology's DRAM market share remained relatively stable, at 22% in Q2 2025, rising to 26% in Q3, falling back to 22% in Q4, and maintaining 22% and 24% in Q1 and Q2 2026 respectively. Although Micron failed to shake the top two positions, its share approached SK Hynix's in Q2 2026, narrowing the gap to only 1 percentage point.
The rise of Chinese manufacturer Changxin Memory (CXMT) is particularly noteworthy. Changxin Memory's DRAM market share started at 4% in Q2 2025, grew to 5% in Q3 2025, reached 8% in both Q4 and Q1 2026, and climbed to 10% by Q2 2026. This means that within a year, Changxin Memory's DRAM market share more than doubled, gradually approaching the mainstream from the industry periphery.
Behind this doubling growth are both strong demand for domestic substitution in the Chinese market and strategic opportunities presented by the restructuring of the global supply chain. Against the backdrop of continued geopolitical tensions, downstream customers in China are accelerating the shift of orders to domestic suppliers to reduce reliance on overseas manufacturers, providing Changxin Memory with a stable and substantial demand base.
Meanwhile, Changxin Memory continues to invest in process technology and capacity expansion, gradually iterating from DDR4 to more advanced products such as DDR5, significantly improving its product competitiveness. Notably, Changxin Memory's revenue in Q2 2026 increased by a staggering 716% year-on-year, far exceeding the industry average. This growth rate not only reflects the pace of its capacity release but also indicates its accelerated transformation from a peripheral player to a mainstream supplier.
Overall, in terms of market size, the DRAM market experienced explosive growth in the second quarter of 2026, increasing by 57% quarter-on-quarter and a staggering 385% year-on-year. This growth reflects the strong demand for memory chips driven by AI infrastructure construction and data center expansion.
SK Hynix Maintains its Lead
In the more segmented High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) market, the landscape shifted dramatically. SK Hynix maintained its global leadership with a 50% market share in the second quarter of 2026, but this was a significant decline from 64% in the second quarter of 2025. Looking back at its five-quarter trend, SK Hynix's HBM share fell from 64% in the second quarter of 2025 to 56% in the third quarter, rebounded slightly to 57% in the fourth quarter, reached a recent high of 58% in the first quarter of 2026, and then fell back to 50% in the second quarter.
Samsung's momentum in catching up in the HBM market has been particularly rapid. Samsung's HBM market share started at 15% in Q2 2025, jumped to 23% in Q3 2025, slightly adjusted to 22% in Q4, fell back to 21% in Q1 2026, and then surged to 33% in Q2 2026. This means Samsung increased its HBM market share by 18 percentage points within a year, narrowing the gap with SK Hynix from 49 percentage points to 17 percentage points.
Micron's HBM market share remained relatively stable, hovering around 21% from Q2 2025 to Q1 2026, before slightly declining to 18% in Q2 2026.
In terms of product structure, the majority of revenue in the current HBM market still comes from HBM3E. HBM4 shipments are expected to gradually materialize in the second half of 2026. As the first supplier to ship HBM4 to Nvidia, Samsung's market share is expected to further increase with the large-scale shipment of HBM4.
Samsung and SK Hynix: A Rivalry
These two South Korean manufacturers differ significantly in their product structure, pricing strategies, and customer binding methods. Counterpoint Research Director Hwang Min-sung analyzes that SK Hynix previously held an absolute lead in the HBM field, with its HBM shipments and revenue share exceeding those of its competitors. Therefore, when HBM prices experienced a temporary decline, the impact was more pronounced.
More importantly, SK Hynix signed numerous long-term supply agreements (LTAs) with downstream customers early on. During the period of rapid increases in memory prices, these early-locked contract prices were significantly lower than current market prices, preventing it from fully benefiting from the price increases.
In contrast, Samsung's strong foundation in the general-purpose DRAM field allows it to fully benefit from the surge in traditional memory prices. Meanwhile, its HBM market share jumped from 15% in Q2 2025 to 33% in Q2 2026, and its HBM4 was the first to be certified by NVIDIA and begin shipping, injecting strong momentum into its overall revenue. Furthermore, Samsung achieved approximately five times the year-on-year growth in DRAM revenue in the second quarter of 2026, surpassing SK Hynix's growth rate, which is directly reflected in the reshuffling of market share.
The memory industry chain continues to restructure. Looking ahead to the second half of the year and 2027, several key variables will determine the market trend. First, the ramp-up of HBM4. As Samsung's HBM4 shipments gradually materialize in the second half of the year, the competitive landscape of the HBM market may be further reshaped. Second, there is the issue of capacity allocation. HBM consumes far more wafer area than traditional DRAM, creating a severe "crowding-out effect" on the supply of ordinary DRAM, meaning that the tight supply situation for consumer-grade DRAM and smartphone memory is unlikely to ease. Finally, there are geopolitical factors. Continued US export controls on China constrain the development of China's HBM industry, but the rapid expansion of Chinese manufacturers such as Changxin Memory in the traditional DRAM field is changing the competitive landscape of the global memory market.
For Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron, the demand for AI servers has become a key variable determining future market rankings. As HBM4 competition fully unfolds, the focus of competition in the DRAM market will shift from the traditional memory cycle to a comprehensive contest of advanced memory technologies, customer loyalty, and capacity layout. For downstream PC, smartphone, and data center customers, the continued rise in memory costs is profoundly changing product design and pricing strategies, and an AI-driven restructuring of the entire industry chain is still ongoing.
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