Graphics card shipments cratered by 50% on the finish of 2022
On: March 1, 2023
This is not essentially the most stunning revelation, however the numbers are nonetheless eye popping. In accordance with long-time graphics market soothsayers JPR, graphics card shipments dropped from 26 million within the final quarter of 2021 to 13 million for a similar interval final yr.
That is an epic 50% drop, year-on-year. Admittedly, the ultimate quarter of final yr did not totally see the good thing about Nvidia and AMD’s new GPU launches. Nvidia’s new RTX 40-series solely appeared in mid October, with the marginally extra mainstream RTX 4070 Ti not rolling out till early this yr.
Likewise, AMD’s RX 7900 sequence, led by the AMD RX 7900 XTX, have been solely launched in mid December, so will barely characteristic within the numbers in any respect. However these caveats apart, we’re nonetheless taking a look at a precipitous drop in GPU numbers on the finish of final yr versus the identical quarter in 2021.
We have documented the explanation why typically sufficient earlier than. 2020 and 2021 noticed an ideal storm of demand pushed by rampant ethereum mining on GPUs, pent up demand from a disappointing earlier era of GPUs from Nvidia and AMD, and at last the distortions of stay-at-home directives throughout the pandemic.
The overall internet results of which was an explosion in demand for Nvidia’s RTX 30-series and AMD RX 6000 GPUs and costs rising to multiples of the really helpful retail determine for an prolonged interval.
Total gross sales of GPUs fell by 38% over the identical interval, however that features built-in and embedded GPUs, neither of that are often gaming related. You do get the odd exception, such because the Steam Deck’s built-in graphics.
If that each one seems like dangerous information, there was a small uptick in discrete graphics card gross sales of seven.8% from Q3 to This autumn 2022. JPR says that This autumn in any given yr is usually flat versus Q3. So, maybe the tide is popping.
After all, it is up for debate whether or not slack demand is an effective or dangerous factor within the quick time period. We might argue that low demand for just a few extra quarters will assist satisfied Nvidia and AMD to regulate their at the moment painful pricing.
Already we’re seeing AMD’s RX 7900 XT drop nicely beneath MSRP. Here is hoping costs proceed to slip. However in some unspecified time in the future demand does want to choose up if the PC is to stay the colourful gaming platform we all know and love.
