Worldwide PC shipments totaled 72-million units in the second quarter of 2022, a 12,6% decline from the second quarter of 2021, according to preliminary results by Gartner.
This is the sharpest decline in nine years for the global PC market, brought on by geopolitical, economic and supply chain challenges impacting all regional markets.
“The decline we saw in the first quarter of 2022 has accelerated in the second quarter, driven by the ongoing geopolitical instability caused by the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, inflationary pressure on spending and a steep downturn in demand for Chromebooks,” says Mikako Kitagawa, research director at Gartner.
“Supply chain disruptions also continued, but the major cause of PC delivery delays changed from component shortages to logistics disruptions. Enterprise buyers continued to experience longer PC delivery times than usual, but the lead times began to improve by the end of the second quarter, partially because key cities in China reopened in the middle of the quarter.
“To maintain profits as inflation increases costs, the PC industry is having to raise average selling prices (ASPs) despite weakening demand. The reduction in the mix of PCs from Chromebooks, which tend to have low price points, and shift to premium products also helped increase the average ASP.
“However, an increase in inventory, especially in the consumer channel, could cause an ASP decline as vendors will try to lower inventory.”
The top three vendors in the worldwide PC market experienced declines in PC shipments in the second quarter of 2022, but their ranking remained unchanged.
The combination of HP declining 27,5% and Dell declining 5,2% allowed Dell to move to within 0,3 percentage points of HP in market share. Apple was the only vendor to experience growth in the second quarter of 2022, driven by the popularity of the M1 device .
Preliminary Worldwide PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 2Q22 (Thousands of Units)
| Company | 2Q22 Shipments | 2Q22 Market Share (%) | 2Q21 Shipments | 2Q21 Market Share (%) | 2Q22-2Q21 Growth (%) |
| Lenovo | 17,863 | 24.8 | 20,419 | 24.8 | -12.5 |
| HP Inc. | 13,506 | 18.8 | 18,617 | 22.6 | -27.5 |
| Dell | 13,298 | 18.5 | 14,035 | 17.0 | -5.2 |
| Apple | 6,365 | 8.8 | 5,822 | 7.1 | 9.3 |
| Acer | 5,094 | 7.1 | 6,264 | 7.6 | -18.7 |
| ASUS | 4,697 | 6.5 | 4,909 | 6.0 | -4.3 |
| Others | 11,186 | 15.5 | 12,359 | 15.0 | -9.5 |
| Total | 72,011 | 100.0 | 82,424 | 100.0 | -12.6 |
Notes: Data includes desk-based PCs, notebook PCs, ultramobile premiums (such as Microsoft Surface) and Chromebooks, but not iPads. All data is estimated based on a preliminary study. Final estimates will be subject to change. The statistics are based on shipments selling into channels. Numbers may not add up to totals shown due to rounding.
Source: Gartner (July 2022)
Lenovo’s worldwide PC shipments declined year-over-year, the third consecutive quarter of decline for the company. However, Lenovo grew 2% in the worldwide desktop PC market, partly because the company improved its supply chain in EMEA.
HP experienced a decline of 27,5% in the second quarter of 2022, primarily due to a steep decrease in Chromebooks shipments.
Dell’s shipments declined year-over-year for the first time since the third quarter of 2020. Shipments were down across all key regions except Latin America where Dell registered 6,5% growth. Despite the overall shipments decline, Dell’s market share increased 1 percentage point compared to a year ago.
The EMEA PC market was the hardest hit in the second quarter of 2022 with a 18% decline in PC shipments, reaching only 17,8-million units.
“This is a major setback in total volume after two years of very strong growth stimulated by Covid-19 and refreshed interest in PCs among consumers and the education segment,” says Kitagawa.
“Abandonment or complete relinquishment of operations in Russia due to war in the Ukraine had an even bigger impact on the PC market, as Russian PC shipments for leading PC vendors used to contribute between 5-10% the total EMEA PC volume.”
EMEA also experienced a 20% decline in laptop shipments, while Chromebook shipments declined over 50% year-over-year. This is the result of overall sluggish demand from consumers across many countries in EMEA, struggling with price increases across many products, especially fuel and energy. A very high level of inflation will negatively impact consumer purchase power in the second half of 2022 and possibly into the first half of 2023.