PC Market Runs Low on RAM to Grow: Shipments Decline 4.9% as Memory Crunch Bites
Global PC shipments fell 4.9% year-over-year in Q2 2026, reaching 63.6 million units, according to IDC. The decline was driven by a memory chip shortage that raised RAM prices and squeezed supply. Lenovo held the top market share at 23.5%, while Dell and Apple saw the steepest drops among the top five vendors.
Background
IDC (International Data Corporation) is a major US-based market research firm whose quarterly PC shipment tracker is widely cited by the tech industry and press. This press release covers Q2 2026 data.
- PC makers are facing a severe shortage of DRAM (memory) and NAND (storage) chips. This is partly driven by the AI boom: data centers and high-end AI servers consume massive amounts of memory, diverting supply away from the PC market and driving up prices.
- The "top 5" PC vendors (Lenovo, HP, Dell, Apple, Asus) all saw shipment declines. Without enough RAM to build PCs, they cannot meet demand.
- This memory crunch comes after a boom period following the COVID-era work-from-home surge (2020-2021). Many consumers and businesses upgraded then and have not yet needed new machines; a weak global economy and a pause in corporate PC refresh cycles had already softened demand before the memory constraints added further pressure.
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