PC Monitor Market Delivers Third Consecutive Quarter of Growth

According to an IDC study, the global PC monitor market ended the second quarter of 2024 with 5.9% growth in unit shipments compared to the same quarter a year ago. This marked the third consecutive quarter of positive year-over-year growth, indicating a recovery of the market after declining in 2022 and 2023.

Several drivers affected the stronger-than-expected performance during the April to June quarter. First, the increased volume can be partly attributed to inventory restocking, mostly on the consumer side. Second, there was a notable effort to address anticipated cost escalations, which occurred due to panel cost increases beginning in April and led to pull-in volume earlier than expected. Third, many vendors continue to aggressively revamp models with 60 Hz refresh rate panels into 100 Hz as the faster panel costs have reached parity. Finally, continued expansion and competition in the consumer and gaming market also led to growth in the second quarter.

Looking ahead, the market outlook remains positive. With panel and other component costs stabilizing, the forecast for monitor shipments remains cautiously optimistic. Additionally, the ongoing migration to Windows 11 PCs is expected to spur further growth in 2024 and 2025. IDC expects the monitor market to exceed 2% annual growth for both 2024 and 2025. The study also found that all major regions surpassed the forecast in 2Q24 except China and Canada. Gaming monitors continue to grow and account for 20% of shipments.

IDC anticipates a disciplined volume recovery through 2025. New models with faster refresh rates, declining prices in bigger screen-sized models, and continued growth in gaming are some of the driving factors, which will mostly benefit the consumer side. Business migration towards Windows 11 PCs and improving office occupancy are also expected to bring some collateral benefits on the commercial side. However, slowed commercial spending on PCs and a disappointing commercial monitor performance in the second quarter have led to a downward revision for the commercial monitor market, which is expected to grow 2.8% in 2024, down from the 3.1% projected in the previous forecast. Overall, IDC has increased the total market outlook to grow 4% in 2024 and 2.3% in 2025 based on improved consumer demand. Beyond 2025, annual shipment volume should stabilize in the range of 132 to 135 million units.

"Commercial monitors have historically taken the majority share of the market, but several factors have led them to grow more slowly than the consumer market in recent times," said Jay Chou, research manager for Worldwide Client Devices for IDC. "A subdued climate for commercial device spending, coupled with a move toward hot-desking and tighter office spaces are all factors that led consumer units to outnumber the commercial side for the first time in 2Q24. The continued growth of ultra-wide monitors and a tilt toward bigger screens in general also reduces the need for multi-monitor setups, which had been a mainstay in many office setups. Going forward, IDC still expects commercial monitors to take a slight majority of shipments but monitor innovations will simply be more appealing to consumers."