Cyber Monday Caps a Chip-Shortage Holiday Season
As Cyber Monday approaches, laptops, TVs, and consoles top wish lists while PS5s and top GPUs remain maddeningly out of stock.
Black Friday’s come and gone, and Cyber Monday is two days out, and if this weekend told us anything, it’s that the chip shortage isn’t done messing with your holiday shopping list. Laptops, TVs, and game consoles are shaping up to be the most-searched electronics categories of the season — which is exactly what you’d expect in a normal year. What’s not normal is how many of those searches are ending in “out of stock.”
The PS5 is the poster child here. It’s been over a year since launch and finding one at retail on a normal Tuesday is still basically a hobby. Discord alert bots, Twitter stock trackers, refreshing Best Buy’s cart page at 3am — that’s the holiday shopping experience for anyone who wants a console under the tree this year instead of a printed IOU card. Graphics cards are in the same boat. If you’re hoping to build or upgrade a gaming PC before the new year, the top-tier cards are either sold out, marked up by resellers, or both.
Why this holiday season specifically
The chip shortage isn’t news at this point — it’s been the backdrop of 2021 since basically the spring. But the holidays put a magnifying glass on it because demand spikes right when supply is least able to flex. Manufacturers can’t just spin up extra capacity in November to meet December demand; the lead times on fabricating chips are measured in months, and every allocation decision was locked in long before Black Friday sales started rolling out. So what you’re seeing on shelves (or not seeing) right now was largely determined by decisions made back in the summer.
Laptops and TVs are faring a little better than consoles and GPUs, mostly because those categories have more SKUs and more manufacturers competing, which spreads the shortage’s pain around instead of concentrating it on one or two hot products. If you’re shopping for a laptop this week, you’ll probably find something in your price range, even if it’s not the exact configuration you wanted. Consoles and flagship GPUs don’t have that luxury — there just aren’t enough alternative products to absorb the demand.
My honest take heading into Cyber Monday: don’t expect deals on the stuff everyone actually wants. Retailers don’t need to discount products that are already selling out at MSRP. Where you’ll find real Cyber Monday value is in the categories with healthier supply — laptops, monitors, smart home gear, audio — not in consoles or top-end graphics cards. If a PS5 bundle shows up at a “discount,” look closely; it’s more likely a markup dressed up as a deal than an actual bargain.
The bigger question is whether any of this eases up in 2022. Industry chatter suggests the shortage bleeds well into next year, possibly through most of it, which means “just wait for the next restock” might remain the default advice for a while longer. For now, if you actually land a PS5 or a 3080 this week, consider it a genuine holiday win.