The personal computer market has finally halted its two-year-long decline in sales, with total shipments growing by 0.3% in the fourth quarter of 2024, according to data released by Gartner Inc. today.

However, the market research firm warned that the recovery could be short-lived, saying that the rising cost of components this year will likely lead to increased prices for desktops and laptops.

Gartner said in its report that some 63.37 million PCs were shipped during the quarter. “The PC market has hit the bottom of its decline after significant adjustment,” said Gartner Director Analyst Mikako Kitagawa. “Inventory was normalized in the fourth quarter of 2023, which had been plaguing the industry for two years.”

The subtle growth in PC sales suggests that demand and supply forces in the market are finally in balance. “However, this situation will likely change due to the anticipated component price hike in 2024, as well as geopolitical and economic uncertainties,” Kitagawa said.

In the Asian supply chain, there has been plenty of talk suggesting that the price of solid-state drives could increase by more than 50% this year because of the rising costs of dynamic random-access memory and NAND flash storage. One report from TrendForce this month said that DRAM and NAND prices could gain more than 23% in the first quarter alone.

Gartner warned that the rising component costs will likely have a negative impact on PC sales, and could send them into decline once again.

In terms of the market’s leading vendors, Gartner puts China’s Lenovo Group Ltd. at the top of the tree, growing its shipments by 3.2% to 16.2 million in the quarter. HP Inc. was ranked second, with shipments rising 5.6% to 13.95 million, while Dell Technologies Inc.’s shipments fell 8.3%, to just 9.98 million. Apple Inc. saw PC shipments grow 7.2% to 6.35 million in the quarter, while ASUSTeK Computer Inc. declined 9.4% to 4.4 million, and Acer Inc. was up 11.1%, to 3.98 million.

Gartner’s data also shows that the U.S. PC market grew by 1.8%, while Europe, the Middle East and Africa rose 8.7%, the first time it has grown since the fourth quarter of 2021. Shipments to Asia-Pacific declined thanks to what Gartner described as a “depressed market” in China.

Other researchers disagree with Gartner’s findings, with International Data Corp. contending that there was no market recovery. According to IDC’s newly published data, PC shipments were down 2.7%, to 67.1 million, meaning an eighth-successive quarter of “sales-out shrinkage,” which refers to shipments to retailers and distributors. Meanwhile, Canalys, the research outfit owned by Informa Group, said PC shipments rose by a more impressive 3%, to 65.3 million, in the quarter.

Photo: Skitterphoto/Pixabay