10GB RAM Phones Are Gone, So Buy 8GB or 12GB Instead

Ten gigabytes was a short-lived size. The five phones that had it by 2019 all came out in the last three months of 2018, and GSMArena marks every one of them as discontinued. Samsung’s, Google’s, Motorola’s and Nothing’s US stores now sell 4, 6, 8, 12 and 16GB, and nothing sits between 8GB and 12GB. Samsung’s Galaxy S and Galaxy A phones there have 6, 8, 12 or 16GB.

On a tight budget, buy 8GB, starting with the Moto G Power 2026 at about $400, and skip 4GB. For most people the right 8GB phone is one with long update support, such as the Pixel 10a. Pay for 12GB, from about $600, if you keep the phone for years or use it hard. 16GB only makes sense if you want 512GB or 1TB of storage anyway.

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A plus sign means virtual RAM

If you do see 10GB on a cheap phone today, look for a plus sign. Makers add extended or virtual RAM to the real figure, and that is storage standing in for memory.

Samsung, Motorola and Tecno all let a phone borrow some of its storage and treat it as memory. Samsung calls this RAM Plus and describes it as using your storage as virtual memory. Motorola calls it RAM Boost. Tecno calls it extended RAM.

The trouble is the advertising. Motorola says the Moto G Stylus 2026 gets up to 24GB of total RAM, which is 8GB of physical memory plus up to 16GB of RAM Boost. Tecno lists the Pova Curve 2 5G as 24GB RAM with 12GB of that extended. In both cases the number to compare with other phones is the smaller one.

Virtual RAM is not a trick. Samsung says it lets you keep more apps open in the background. Motorola’s own footnote adds that the RAM you can use is less than the headline figure. So read the big number as real memory plus a top-up, and judge the phone on the real memory.

Cheapest phone at each RAM size

Prices are the makers’ own US store prices, rounded.

Samsung asks about $490 for a phone with 6GB, and Motorola sells one with 8GB for about $400. Memory is only one part of a phone, but check the figure before assuming the dearer phone has more.

If you also care how the phone unlocks, we keep a list of phones with in-display fingerprint readers.

Is 8GB of RAM enough for a phone?

It is for most people, and the Pixel 10a is the reason we say so. Google sells it at about $600 with 8GB and promises seven years of operating system and security updates. If Google expects 8GB to carry a phone that far, it will carry most people. The Pixel 10a is on the Google Store.

Between about $400 and $600, 8GB is the usual figure. Motorola puts it in the Moto G Power, the Moto G Stylus and the Edge 2026, Samsung in the Galaxy A57 5G, and Nothing in the base Phone (4a) Pro. Apple does not print a RAM figure on its iPhone spec pages. GSMArena lists the iPhone 17 at 8GB and the iPhone 18 Pro at 12GB.

Moto G Power 2026 on Amazon, Samsung Galaxy A57 5G on Amazon, Moto G Stylus 2026 on Amazon

When 12GB is worth paying for

Keep a phone for four or five years, or switch between heavy apps all day, and 12GB earns its price. More apps stay open in the background, so fewer of them reload when you go back to them. On the Google Store, the storage chooser for the Pixel 11 Pro says the higher storage and RAM options give better multitasking and smoother performance, which is a fair summary. Otherwise 8GB will do.

12GB is what the main Samsung and Google flagships start with. Samsung says the Galaxy S26 and S26+ come with 12GB whichever storage size you choose. Google lists 12GB for the Pixel 10, the Pixel 11 and the 256GB Pixel 11 Pro.

The cheapest way to 12GB is the Nothing Phone (4a) Pro with 256GB of storage at about $600, which is $100 more than the 8GB version. The Nothing Phone (3) has 12GB at about $700, marked down from $799 on Nothing’s store.

Nothing Phone (4a) Pro on Amazon, Google Pixel 10 on Amazon, Samsung Galaxy S26 on Amazon

16GB comes with the biggest storage

16GB is the most these US stores sell, and makers do not sell it on its own. On the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra it comes only with 1TB, at about $2,000. The 256GB version with 12GB is about $1,400, so the step up costs $600, and Samsung pitches the 1TB phone at power users, gamers and people who shoot high-resolution video. The Google Pixel 11 Pro has 12GB on the 256GB version at about $1,100 and 16GB on the 512GB and 1TB versions, with the 512GB phone about $120 more.

Buy 16GB for the storage that comes with it, not for the memory alone. The Nothing Phone (3) is the exception. It has 16GB with 512GB of storage at about $800, the cheapest 16GB phone here, and $100 for 4GB more memory and twice the storage is a fair price.

Nothing Phone (3) on Amazon, Google Pixel 11 Pro on Amazon, Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra on Amazon

Why we would avoid 4GB

The clearest reason comes from a phone maker. Infinix says on its own site that some features of its software, and major upgrades, need 6GB or more. A 4GB phone can be left behind by its own manufacturer.

The Moto G 2026 has 4GB and a list price of about $300, with Motorola’s store offering it at about $250. Motorola describes it as expandable up to 12GB with RAM Boost, but the real memory is 4GB. The Moto G Power 2026 costs about $100 more than the Moto G’s list price and has 8GB, which makes it the better buy of the two.

The five 10GB phones of 2018

GSMArena lists the OnePlus 6T McLaren Edition (10GB with 256GB of storage, announced December 2018) and the Vivo NEX Dual Display (10GB with 128GB, announced December 2018). The others had 10GB on the top version only: the Nubia Red Magic Mars, announced November 2018, and the Xiaomi Mi Mix 3 and Xiaomi Black Shark Helo, both announced October 2018.