What you need to know
- Graphics cards have become a sought-after commodity due to the global chip shortage.
- Jon Peddie Research has a report that states the global GPU market managed growth to the tune of 101 million units in Q3 2021.
- CPU shipments also saw a year-over-year increase.
The global chip shortage has had all kinds of ramifications for the world at large. Entire industries, such as the smartphone and automotive spaces, have clashed in order to secure chips. The United States and China continue to wage war on each other in the tech sector to influence chip production and disrupt each other's supply chains. And, more important than any of that other stuff, PC gamers have been deprived of graphics cards with which to play the award-winning Square Enix title Marvel's Avengers.
It's not as though graphics cards don't exist right now. They do, and are selling in record numbers at all-time high prices. It's just that there aren't enough of them to go around. It's estimated that 25% of that problem is due to crypto enthusiasts and scalpers. However, even if gamers can't get the best graphics cards, the shipment figures don't lie: NVIDIA and AMD are making bank.
According to a report from Jon Peddie Research, GPU shipments are up 12% year-over-year, though they're down 18.2% from the heights of last quarter. Q3 2021 saw the GPU market's growth boom to 101 million units. Intel retains 62% of the market, while NVIDIA holds 20% and AMD hangs onto 18%.
Also worth noting is that CPUs performed similarly in Q3 2021, seeing a 9% year-over-year shipment increase alongside a 23.1% quarter-to-quarter decrease.
JPR's Jon Peddie highlighted the pandemic's effect on these somewhat out-of-the-ordinary figures. "Covid continues to unbalance the fragile supply chain that relied too heavily upon a just-in-time strategy," he said. "We don't expect to see a stabilized supply chain until the end of 2022. In the meantime, there will be some surprises."
