Global PC market posts first drop in 2 years — Q2 -3.6%, Apple defies at +15.9% on MacBook Neo
TL;DR
Omdia: Q2 2026 global PC shipments fell 3.6% to 65.7M — first drop in two years. Apple bucked with +15.9% to 7.3M units on MacBook Neo demand.
Omdia published Q2 2026 global PC shipment numbers on July 9: 65.7 million units, down 3.6% YoY — the first negative quarter in two years. IDC's parallel count came in at 68.2M, -4.9%, with the gap sitting in laptop-scope methodology. Same direction: the line is dropping, only Apple is climbing.
Apple shipped 7.3M units in Q2, +15.9% YoY per Omdia, the only major vendor in double digits. IDC pins share at 9.9%, closing on the 10% Mac ceiling — a decade ago the number was around 7%. A single model, the MacBook Neo, absorbed high-end upgrade demand out of the Windows side.
Hardest hit: HP at 19.1% share, -9%. Dell -5%, Lenovo -2.1% (still #1 at 24.4%), ASUS +0.2%. By form factor, desktop -1.3%, laptops -4.2% — laptops carry the highest memory-cost sensitivity.
The trigger is still Q1's memory spike: DRAM and NAND capacity flowed to AI-server HBM, and Q2 OEMs had to push cost onto retail. IDC's analyst put it directly: "shipments are falling but revenue is climbing, because vendors are raising prices faster than demand is dropping."
Against x86, Apple Silicon's SoC + unified-memory design turned into an accidental cost moat this cycle: an M-series chip ships with memory bonded on, so Apple never pulls LPDDR die-by-die from Samsung and Hynix the way Windows OEMs do.
Win the bet, and Apple pushes Mac past 10% global share on the back of MacBook Neo. Lose it, and Windows x86 OEMs wait until 2027 HBM capacity clears to get memory costs back on a predictable curve.
via Sina Tech / 9to5Mac / Wccftech
Apple shipped 7.3M units in Q2, +15.9% YoY per Omdia, the only major vendor in double digits. IDC pins share at 9.9%, closing on the 10% Mac ceiling — a decade ago the number was around 7%. A single model, the MacBook Neo, absorbed high-end upgrade demand out of the Windows side.
Hardest hit: HP at 19.1% share, -9%. Dell -5%, Lenovo -2.1% (still #1 at 24.4%), ASUS +0.2%. By form factor, desktop -1.3%, laptops -4.2% — laptops carry the highest memory-cost sensitivity.
The trigger is still Q1's memory spike: DRAM and NAND capacity flowed to AI-server HBM, and Q2 OEMs had to push cost onto retail. IDC's analyst put it directly: "shipments are falling but revenue is climbing, because vendors are raising prices faster than demand is dropping."
Against x86, Apple Silicon's SoC + unified-memory design turned into an accidental cost moat this cycle: an M-series chip ships with memory bonded on, so Apple never pulls LPDDR die-by-die from Samsung and Hynix the way Windows OEMs do.
Win the bet, and Apple pushes Mac past 10% global share on the back of MacBook Neo. Lose it, and Windows x86 OEMs wait until 2027 HBM capacity clears to get memory costs back on a predictable curve.
via Sina Tech / 9to5Mac / Wccftech
