Personal computer monitor shipments have recorded their first year-over-year decline since the start of the pandemic, a sign that a boost in hardware sales resulting from the remote work trend is coming to an end.

International Data Corp. said in its Worldwide Quarterly PC Monitor Tracker that shipments fell 7.2% in the third quarter of 2021 to just 34.8 million units, after recording five consecutive quarters of year-over-year growth.

More specifically, it seems the market is stagnating in North America and Western Europe because of what IDC said is a “softening in consumer demand.” Less important markets such as Asia/Pacific and Africa still saw growth.

Other challenges, including lingering supply chain and logistics difficulties, also hurt shipments, IDC said.

Companies in some parts of the world have recently began insisting their workers return to the office and that has helped ease the decline somewhat, IDC said. Firms have invested in new kit in order to entice workers back to the office. After all, PC monitors are fairly cheap, with $300 able to buy some fancy kit, so it’s an easy way for companies to show some love to their employees.

The commercial demand for PC monitors helped Dell Technologies Inc. and Lenovo Group Ltd. buck the trend and record positive growth of 20.6% and 6.9%, respectively. However, all other PC monitor vendors saw shipments decline.

Commercial monitor shipments fell 2% year-over-year, while the consumer PC monitor market fell 12%, IDC said.

The trend is likely to continue, with IDC predicting further declines in the fourth quarter, though it says overall shipments for 2021 will come out about 4.6% ahead of last year.

“We expect the market to achieve peak volume as we end 2021 with the highest shipment levels since 2012,” said IDC analyst Jay Chou.

The good news for PC monitor makers is that they can expect to benefit from a much larger customer base that will want regular refreshes of their hardware. That’s because remote work is likely here to stay – in the form of hybrid work, where employees will come into the office once or twice a week and work at home the rest of the time. The implication is that every hybrid worker now needs two bits of hardware where previously they required only one.

“We believe the changes wrought by the permanency of hybrid work and flexible learning will enable faster refresh rates across all user segments,” said Chou.

It’s not just PC monitor sales that are in a downward trend. IDC has forecast that sales of PC themselves will also cool off into the new year, though the market is likely to continue to show moderate growth for the time being.

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