Memory is dragging the semiconductor industry across the trillion-dollar line, according to Gartner, which now forecasts 2026 chip revenue of $1.6T, up 92 percent from the $809B recorded in 2025.
The research firm sees the market climbing to $1.9T in 2027, with memory the single biggest engine.
DRAM leads the charge with an expected 246.6 percent revenue jump this year; NAND flash follows at 371.9 percent growth.
Memory alone is on track for $837B in 2026 sales, and a year later that number crosses $1T.
Strip out memory and growth looks far calmer: Gartner projects the rest of the industry at $718B in 2026, up 21.9 percent, and $864B in 2027.
The AI data center ecosystem explains the imbalance. Gartner says it will account for 36.5 percent of all semiconductor revenue this year and more than 53 percent by 2030, a structural shift in where the money lands. Bigger, hungrier AI clusters are pulling in CPUs, networking silicon, power management, analog parts and optical interconnects.
The forecast lands amid surging memory prices and record hyperscaler capital spending on AI infrastructure.
