The big picture: shipments in 2022 showed a decline in the entire technology industry, but the decline in sales of desktop GPUs could be historic. In a year when several major products were launched, the sharp drop in shipments is likely due to several factors. Despite the market-wide decline, Nvidia managed to significantly increase its market share.
In John Peddy’s 2022 GPU Market Survey, the third quarter shows the lowest total sales of desktop graphics cards since at least 2005. Like many other products, sales of GPUs in 2020 and 2021 increased dramatically due to customers working remotely, but the hangover for this looks especially hard. market.
In the third quarter of 2022, Intel, AMD and Nvidia collectively delivered just under 6.9 million discrete graphics cards for desktop PCs, which is 47% less than last year. For comparison, the economic collapse of 2008 caused a similar 46 percent decline from the fourth quarter of 2007 (a record market high that coincided with the launch of the legendary Nvidia 8800 GT graphics card) to the fourth quarter of 2008.
The fall of 2022 hit the red team harder than the green team. While Nvidia has reduced shipments of discrete desktop GPUs by 40% compared to last year, AMD has fallen by 74%.
The decline after the lockdown, which affected PCs, tablets, smartphones and other devices, is the main factor, but another factor is unique for GPUs — the end of cryptocurrency mining. John Peddy’s data includes users who have bought GPUs for Ethereum mining, which in recent years has led to inflated sales and prices. The crypto winter of 2022, combined with the Ethereum merger that put an end to GPU-based mining, significantly undermined the market.
This year Nvidia and AMD have released new flagship GPUs, introducing the RTX 4000 and Radeon RX 7000 series, respectively, but only in the expensive segment for enthusiasts. In 2023, sales may improve somewhat depending on how companies evaluate the upcoming mass recordings in these video card lines.
Intel’s problematic entry into the discrete graphics arena in 2022 with the Arc Alchemist series brought the company up to 4% market share. Meanwhile, Nvidia’s share jumped 10.2% year-on-year to 86% in the third quarter, bringing AMD’s market share down to 10%, or 52%.
Most of the surge in GPU shipments in 2020 and 2021 came from laptop graphics, which also experienced the sharpest drop. Sales of specialized desktop graphics have been gradually declining over the past two decades as laptops and embedded GPUs have become good enough for a growing number of consumers.
