Possible RAM upgrade - Performance Decrease?

[ZeroGHippo]

Hi all, so I currently have 2x8gb of ballistix sport 2666 ddr4 ram in dual channel I need more, but I don't know if it would be worth it to lose dual channel. The deal is, I can't afford to go and buy 2 more sticks, but I can buy 1. Is is worth it to drop dual channel to have 24gb of ram until I can buy that 4th stick, or should I wait on that? I mainly use my pc for gaming but also render videos and other things, and on some games like star citizen and escape from tarkov I end up using swap space. Thanks!

[Fasauceome]

Reducing your ram bandwidth by going single channel will hold you back. Save up to maintain dual channel.

[Srnewbee]

hmm if the game requires more than 16gb, it will definitely benefit from having extra rams. But as fasauceome mentioned, it is not ideal to have 3 slots since you lose dual channel capability.