What you need to know
- The International Data Corporation (IDC) says global PC shipments grew by 3% in the second quarter of 2024.
- The research firm attributes the growth to the hype around AI PCs and the great PC refresh.
- China's market continues to suffer, holding global PC shipment growth back from realizing its full potential.
The economy is seemingly taking shape, and the global PC shipment growth over the past few months backs this claim. In May, Counterpoint Research shared a report indicating global PC shipments grew by 3% in Q1 2024, with an AI PC jolt expected to drive even more sales throughout the year.
As it happens, the PC shipment is well on its way to recovery. According to a new report by the International Data Corporation (IDC), the market grew by 3% in the second quarter of 2024 — translating to 64.9 million units.
Breaking it down by vendor, according to IDC, Lenovo is still number one with 14.7 million shipments of PCs (22.7% market), which is up 3.7% year-on-year (YoY). HP is second, shipping 1.8% more PCs in 2024 (so far) compared to 2023, while Dell, at number three, slipped by shipping 2.4% fewer PCs compared to last year.
Apple, which often garners a lot of press attention, is the 4th top vendor of PCs and laptops with a substantial 20.8% increase in shipments over 2023, likely due to continued refreshes of its popular MacBook line. However, it "only" shipped 5.7 million PCs compared to Lenovo's 14.7 million, and only half of what Dell does demonstrates the gap in adoption between Windows and macOS, mostly due to enterprise and government markets.
Unfortunately, companies like ASUS and Razer get lumped into "others."
Ryan Reith, group vice president of IDC's Worldwide Device Trackers, says:
"Make no mistake, the PC market just like other technology markets faces challenges in the near term due to maturity and headwinds. However, two consecutive quarters of growth, combined with plenty of market hype around AI PCs and a less sexy but arguably more important commercial refresh cycle, seems to be what the PC market needed. The buzz is clearly around AI, but a lot is happening with non-AI PC purchasing to make this mature market show signs of positivity."
IDC reports weak results in China, which continues to hold the market. If China is excluded, global shipments would've grown "more than 5%" year-over-year. Be it as it may, global shipments show significant growth compared to 2023's performance when the economy was still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.
As previously highlighted by market analysts and experts, IDC attributes the PC shipment recovery to the hype building around exciting announcements from industry players about their AI PC strategies. Microsoft also launched Copilot+ PCs powered by Qualcomm's powerful Snapdragon chips during the second quarter of 2024. It's possible that the launch also contributed to the growth witnessed in global PC shipments.
Apple's AI strategy and integration of Apple Intelligence across its tech stack might positively impact global PC shipments, with product refreshes on the horizon. As we all know, Microsoft is set to cut support for Windows 10 on October 14, 2025.
The company has been using aggressive ad campaigns across its Windows services to warn users about Windows 10's looming death to get users to upgrade to Windows 11. There's a huge possibility that the mass transition to Windows 11 could also positively contribute to the growth of global PC shipments soon.
