A three-year growth streak for gaming PCs and gaming monitors came to an end in 2022 as worldwide gaming PC shipments declined 6.4% while gaming monitors declined 7.1% compared to 2021, according to the IDC Worldwide Quarterly Gaming Tracker.
A total of 44.9 million gaming PCs and 17.3 million gaming monitors were shipped during the year, which was well above pre-pandemic levels in 2019. Looking ahead, IDC expects 2024 to be a year of recovery as 2023 will be marred with macroeconomic challenges, inventory issues, and a lack of meaningful upgrades.
"Excess inventory carried over from 2022 is leading to discounting of older generation systems while also hampering re-orders of the latest generation of gaming PCs," said Jitesh Ubrani, research manager for IDC's Mobility and Consumer Device Trackers. "The vast supply of add-in boards in the secondary GPU market further compounds the issue as it helps prolong the life of existing gaming desktops and suppresses demand for new systems."
"The excessive power requirements of the latest GPUs is hampering the growth of both new gaming desktops and notebooks as it tips the scales of performance per dollar in favor of last year's models while the rise of mobile and handheld gaming is also affecting gamers' share of wallet," continued Ubrani.
"Gaming monitors contracted last year, the first-ever decline in shipments since IDC began tracking this market in 2016," said Jay Chou, research manager for IDC's Worldwide Quarterly PC Monitor Tracker. "There was a phenomenal buildup of stock so inventories will need at least a couple more quarters to return to normal. Beyond the short term, we remain optimistic. A gaming monitor offers a relatively inexpensive way to improve the gaming experience and with new developments forthcoming, we still expect a recovery in the latter part of 2023."
Despite the short-term negativity, the markets for gaming PCs and monitors are generally expected to outperform the overall PC and monitor markets as the total volume for gaming products grows from 58.8 million in 2023 to 75.1 million in 2027.
