It's dire: Raspberry Pi availability tracker is launched (2024)

Yesterday André Costa emailed me about his new website, rpilocator.

It's a website to track Raspberry Pi 4 model B, Compute Module 4, Pi Zero 2 W, and Pico availability across multiple retailers in different countries.

In his own words:

This database was created out of frustration trying to locate a Raspberry Pi product in the height of the chip and supply chain shortages of 2021. I got tired of visiting multiple websites every day trying to figure out if there were any Raspberry Pi's in stock. I coded this website in a few days during my spare time and had it hosted on a Raspberry Pi for a couple of weeks before deciding to make it publicly available. This is not hosted on a Raspberry Pi anymore.

André has tried including all the official Pi vendors (who contractually will sell Pi models at MSRP and not the insane markups you'll find on eBay or Amazon), but some block script-based access, so only about half the vendors are currently accounted for.

Checking yesterday, two models were available—across all the 29 models tracked. And today that number's down to one, a lonely CM4 model with 2 GB of RAM, 32 GB eMMC storage, and WiFi/Bluetooth.

When will the situation improve? Well, there's this, straight from the horse's mouth:

Ex-stock availability is going to take a while, but we're planning to build ~150ku this quarter, and nearly ~500ku next quarter. That compares to 250ku in the whole of 2021.
— Eben Upton (@EbenUpton) January 25, 2022

It seems the CM4 availability may improve later this year, but when exactly is anyone's guess. Many people see lead times of "late 2022" or "January 2023", and think the worst, but usually if it's more than six months out, that just means the retailer is like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ and it could be anywhere from weeks to years before they get stock.

For the Pi 4, the situation may improve even sooner:

We're building as fast as we can, prioritising 2GB and 4GB, but 8GB stock should start to flow through in the next few weeks.
— Eben Upton (@EbenUpton) January 17, 2022

But it remains to be seen. Right now, the best we can do is dig through drawers and boxes and find that old Pi 3 model B to tide us over until a Pi 4 is available again...

Check out https://rpilocator.com — and at least for Newark, PiShop, SparkFun, Seeed Studio, Farnell, The Pi Hut, and Adafruit, maybe it can save you a few dozen page refreshes every day.

Comments

I just impulse-ordered a Pi 4 2GB for €50 at berrybase.de, which is only €10 above MSRP (a steal nowadays). They had about 2000 on stock on Friday, but they were all gone by Saturday.

I would have probably preferred the 4GB version (more for peace of mind than actual need), but who knows when this will be available again for a reasonable price.

We finally secured an order of 1080 units of CM4108008's directly from Raspberry Pi to ship with our PiBox! They guaranteed delivery by July, but said they might be able to pull it into May or perhaps earlier. We will get confirmation later this week. Keep your fingers crossed for earlier!

It sounds like you may have been able to get a batch from the planned 500k units they're going to be stamping out this year. Hope that it happens sooner rather than later!

Who did you reach out to "directly from Raspberry Pi"?

Presumably someone through this contact form—I believe there is also an email for industry inquiries for those interested in bulk purchases, but I don't remember what it is.

I have 2 4gb versions in my store.

Still got them?

I appreciate you enthusiasm, but you have at some point to question your responsability in this.
Clusters are nice to talk about, but useless gimmick for most people who will buy more units for playing a few weeks then keeping them in drawers.
Also, a site to get realtime worldwide availability will create a faster shortage simply because it does advertise said shortage and create an incentive.
You can believe you have zero impact in the situation, but I'm sure you understand basic economic principles and the fact that you are not really a minimalistic mentor...

I'm flattered that you think my website will have an impact on a global supply chain shortage. But the truth is there are companies out there that order several thousand of these at once. I'm just trying to help out the little guys in having a chance to find them in stock at a retail store

Come on Hugo, be realistic - responsibility for people keeping Pi's/SBCs in draws (for those that may do so) does not sit with Jeff. And the shortage is not a permanent state of affairs.

Perhaps get some air and take it easy?

I do own a RPI 4B, recently bought from the Pi Hut in the UK. It is most likely going to sit in the drawer 90% of the time, but I bought it as a secondary computer to complement my iPad for the one or two things (networking etc) I still need a computer for.

How dare we exchange our capital for products under this economic system of capitalism! Where the basic economic principals are people will make purchases based on the cost to them (and therefore for the proletarian workforce, their labour time) and therefore make purchasing decisions based on whether it is worth that cost to them, you therefore don’t have any extra rights to said product than anyone else using it for any other task.

Be quiet

Nobody asked you

If you don't like capitalism feel free to move to Cuba, North Korea, or Venezuela. You will find there that many more things than raspis are out of stock

Some stores have kits available that aren't too overpriced.

Raspberry Pi Australia have Zero 2w kits, the cheapest is with a GPIO reference card https://raspberry.piaustralia.com.au/products/raspberry-pi-zero-2-w-wit… for AU$26 (aprox US$18) which is pretty reasonable. They also have RPi4 4GB for AU$107 (US$75, a little overpriced), but I'm waiting for a 8Gb :(

Also in Australia https://core-electronics.com.au/raspberry-pi/boards.html have Pi4 2 & 4Gb at better prices, but, again no 8Gb.

Thanks for mentioning this Doug, I have been looking for a Zero 2w for a while and had not noticed the kit version for a few dollars more, I managed to grab one. Going to try this on my Prusa MK3s.

Andre, the maker of rpilocator.com, here. Thanks for mentioning my website. I've gotten great feedback so far and I've been adding more stores as requested by many of your readers.

Here is what I have observed in my quest to find RPi's in stock.

They do come in stock, but they fly off the shelf fast. Just in the last few weeks, I've seen Pi Zero 2's, Pi 4's, and CM4's in stock around the world. US stores sell out FAST.

Re. CM4's: I've seen many mentions that large CM4 purchases get a preference since these computers are targeted to industrial customers. Makes sense from a business standpoint but it sucks for the little tinkerer pals and gals out there. They do come in stock at online stores though. Again, they just sell out fast.

Pi Zero 2 stock has been going around the world lately. Just keep checking and you'll be able to find one. Adafruit has had stock twice in the last month, I got one from Pishop(US) last week, and Pishop(CA) has them in stock right now.

For those of you in New Zealand.... enjoy, looks like great stock over ther :)

I got a zero 2 from one of the official US distributors last week. I was kind of surprised when it let me add one and check out, but it did arrive! $15 plus shipping. Sweet.

Hey, thank you for signal boosting this app! Thanks to you and André, I just placed an order on a Zero 2 W that I've been after for months. Cheers!

That's awesome to hear.

Is it possible to include another devices (like coral) in rpilocator?

I was surfing the Pi vendors sites on Friday 1/28/22 . I went on Adafruit.com and low and behold there was Rasberry Pi 4B 4gb in stock.
I immediately hit the buy now button. I checked a few hours later and they were all gone. That is how quickly the Rasberry pis are swooped up. The Rasberry pi pico is easy to come by. In December I was able to get a Rasberry pi zer 2 W from Digital key because I was on their waiting list for about a month. Just keep trying and luck will come your way. Another site to check is Newark.com.

I spoke to the people at Raspberry Pi UK at a hardware event a couple of months ago. They told me the RPi 4 and Zero 2 have a more robust supply chain because they bought a ton of wafers for those pre-pandemic but are waiting on other components. I asked when they expected the situation to be resolved and was told Q2.

Newark is giving me an estimate of May for an order of CM4s I placed in December... They listed stock in the UK but refuse to fulfill from that facility for whatever reason

Thank you so much for boosting this! I'm just looking for a replacement for my 8+ year old model B rev 2 and hopefully I'll be able to snag one with the help of rpilocator. Good luck to everyone looking to buy a pi!

Thank a lot, Jeff and Andre

Just bought my first cm4 from seeed and a router carrier board from dfrobot

I am in Vancouver Canada and decided to upgrade to Raspberry Pi 3, Pi 4.
December 31 2022=no idea
There are NO Raspberry PI available in the province of British Columbia except for the pico. I am starting to check the entire country in the stores that I know, nothing in Alberta... Next

I'm getting 2023 availability on my side of the coast.
I don't believe it, but that's what I'm told.

We're almost in 2023 now, and I still can't find a single Pi 4 in Canada

It appears the website is down. Are you aware of any problems or did you take it down intentionally?

First, it's not my site :)

Second, please check out the rpilocator Twitter account — it seems they've been having hosting issues today.

Quite sad all this. Still a problem mid March '22. And you have to wonder what the impact is going to be on any potential Pi 5. I'm guessing that isn't going to happen for some time.

:-(

Pishop.us has some in stock not on the tracker and so does canakit.

I ordered, a Pi 4 from CPC about a month ago. The accessories came, the Pi did not. It has now been bumped to November 2022.

I take that date to mean they actually have no clue!

This comment is for a technical issue. I'm trying to filter on Pi Zero 2W - a.k.a. 'SC0510'. I enter that in the "Filter" text box - URHC of the page. I get about 15 entries on page 1 that says '1-75' at the bottom. The next page (2) has a few more 'SC0510'.

Just thought you'd want to know.

thanks for the website. i am planning to get a pi4/2gb even though, currently, I just need a cups & samba + pi-hole machine. hopefully 2023 brings me a chance to grab fresh stock.

Reading this more than a year later and the situation is much, much worse says 1 thing: NEVER EVER BUY Raspberry Pi again in my life. I told so many people over the past 10 years the reason why I dont use Raspberry Pi, is because its a consumer device and even though they make extended temperature variants, they dont have a supply chain mindset. How many businesses went out of business that based their whole offering on Raspberry Pi. For interest sake I was looking for CM4 and its just very crazy. $200 for a module from Amazon. For me its stay away from consumer suppliers for the next 10 years.

It's dire: Raspberry Pi availability tracker is launched (2024)

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