Worldwide PC shipments fell 20.1% year on year in the third quarter of 2026, to 62.7 million units, according to preliminary numbers from IDC released October 8th. It’s the second drop in a row, and a far deeper one than the 3.8% dip in the second quarter.
IDC calls it a pull-in hangover. Early in the year, PC makers and the distributors and stores that sell their machines (the “channel,” in industry speak) loaded up on stock to get ahead of memory-driven price hikes, which IDC ties to the AI data center buildout. That borrowed sales from the second half. The third quarter is normally bigger than the second. This year, shipments fell 9.1% from Q2 instead, as stores worked through the PCs they’d already bought. (Read: the warehouses were full.)
The pain wasn’t shared evenly. The three biggest PC makers all fell faster than the market: Lenovo shipped 14.9 million PCs (down 22.6%), HP 10.3 million (down 30.9%) and Dell 7.6 million (down 25%). Together, they gave up 4.2 points of market share. Apple shipped 5.9 million Macs, down 11.3%. Asus shipped 5.5 million, down 8.6%, the smallest drop in the top five.
Omdia’s count, out October 9th, tells the same story with a different total: 58.1 million PCs, down 21.2%. Its numbers for Lenovo, HP and Dell land within a rounding error of IDC’s. Apple is where they split: Omdia has Apple at 6.8 million Macs, nearly a million more than IDC. Omdia also put a number on the memory squeeze. Ben Yeh, its principal analyst, said memory and storage chips (DRAM and SSDs) have gone from around 15% of a PC’s parts cost to nearly 40%. Omdia expects shipments to fall 24% in the fourth quarter.
So what if you need a laptop now? Jitesh Ubrani, IDC’s research director for consumer devices, said stores and distributors are worried about carrying too much stock while high prices keep shoppers away. That “could translate into promotions and some short-term relief for consumers,” he said. Just don’t expect last year’s prices. “Prices will remain elevated,” Ubrani said.
The take
This is a buyer’s window, not a buyer’s market. If your laptop still works, keep it and watch for the clearance deals IDC expects. If you need one now, buy all the memory and storage you’ll need for the next few years up front. Those are the parts driving these price hikes, and we don’t see them getting cheaper soon.
