Intel is reportedly preparing yet another CPU price hike, adding to the previous increases implemented in February and March. According to the latest research and channel checks from Chinese market research firm Minutes Logic Society, Intel plans to add another price increase to its existing ones. In February, Intel implemented a first round of CPU price increases ranging from 10% to 15%, depending on the segment and SKU. Just a month later, the company introduced another increase in March, around 15%, with earlier reports suggesting a 10% hike for the consumer CPU sector, like the Core Ultra family of CPUs. This time, we are expecting another increase in May across the overall CPU portfolio, meaning that Intel will again raise prices by a few more percent, depending on the CPU sector, whether it is a Core Ultra CPU or a Xeon server processor.
The total cumulative goal for the price hike is about 30% higher compared to 2025 pricing. Interestingly, Intel is facing a significant problem with CPU supply that it can't address immediately. While a large portion of CPU production is internal, with Intel Foundry handling a bulk of orders, some CPUs require TSMC's silicon for Intel to ship these CPUs. Especially with multi-die packaging, where some parts are manufactured on Intel's node and others on TSMC's node, shipping is impossible until every part arrives and Intel assembles it with its advanced packaging.
The demand driving these CPU orders is largely from AI data centers, which are now purchasing so many CPUs that barely any are left. For example, in the initial AI data center buildout wave, the majority of server infrastructure spending was on GPUs, which outnumbered CPUs by more than 12 GPUs per single CPU on average. However, this number has risen significantly due to the increased compute needs and the way modern AI is utilized, pushing the CPU-to-GPU ratio to 1:8, with some estimates suggesting it could go as high as 1:4—four GPUs per single CPU socket. This translates to a multi-fold increase in CPU demand, where AMD, Intel, and other Arm-based players can't keep up. Intel is addressing this with some pricing adjustments as CPUs become harder to access, while manufacturing is slowly picking up pace.
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