Why IDC, Gartner and Canalys disagree on PC market growth
The three analyst houses have each published their own perspectives of the market in Q2. We unpick the info on the key areas where they agree and disagree
The three main analyst houses used by the IT industry to size up the market have each published their own perspectives on how the PC market shaped up in the second quarter of 2020.
IDC, Gartner and Canalys have each published PC shipment figures for Q2- and all three analyst houses say the market actually grew for the three months ending 31 June.
Despite agreeing that the PC market was on the up, the growth rates given by each analyst house vary greatly - with one firm saying the market grew by 2.8 per cent and another claiming that growth in shipments hit double figures at 11.2 per cent.
The most optimistic data comes from IDC, which claims global PC shipments grew by 11.2 per cent in Q2 to 72.3 million units.
In a similar vein to the first three months of the year, Gartner's data remains the most pessimistic out of the three firms, claiming that shipments grew by just 2.8 per cent in Q2 to 64.8 million units.
Canalys' figures meanwhile sit closer to IDC's than Gartner's - both in terms of shipment growth and total shipments. They believe shipments grew by nine per cent to 72.9 million units.
Which vendors won, and which lost?
Both Canalys and IDC believe that HP overtook Lenovo as the PC market kingpin in Q2, with both firms claiming that it took a 25 per cent share of the market and logged a 17.7 per cent growth in shipments.
Dropping into second place, IDC and Canalys believe Lenovo's shipments grew by around seven per cent, but its market share fell by either 70 or 40 basis points to 24.1 per cent (IDC) or 23.9 per cent (Canalys).
Gartner meanwhile believes that the status quo was maintained in Q2, with Lenovo just about edging out HP as the world's largest vendor by shipments with 4.2 per cent growth and a 25 per cent market share.
Despite putting Lenovo in the top spot, Gartner nonetheless believes that HP gained ground during the quarter, logging 17 per cent shipment growth.
All three analysts have Apple and Acer rounding off the top five, with IDC claiming that Apple grew its shipments by 36 per cent during the quarter, while Canalys has this at 13.1 per cent and Gartner at 5.1 per cent.
Regional comparisons
All three analyst houses agree that EMEA was among the best performing regions globally.
IDC did not give a figure, but said the EMEA market saw "strong double-digit growth" during the quarter. Gartner meanwhile says the EMEA PC market grew by a 20 per cent, with Canalys believing it was even higher at 25 per cent.
IDC claims that supply chain constraints, which blighted the PC market in Q1, recovered in Q2, helped the EMEA market during the quarter, as vendors moved to address a pent up demand among customers.
Canalys claims that the EMEA market, along with North America, were well equipped to handle a mass shift towards remote working and home schooling and expects these trends to continue beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.
Lastly, Gartner claims that Q2 was the highest quarter of growth for the PC market for more than 10 years. It echoed remarks by IDC and Canalys, pointing to increased remote working demand as well as efforts to restock its channels' supply.
Growth rates in the US, meanwhile, vary significantly among the three analyst houses. IDC claims that the US saw "double-digit growth" and Canalys claims shipments were up by 11 per cent, but Gartner has this at a much more modest 3.5 per cent.
What does the future hold?
All three analyst gave their own two pennies-worth on how the PC market will play out for the rest of the year.
Both IDC and Gartner emphasise that the boost in the PC market will be short lived.
IDC claims that a global recession and shrinking IT budgets, coupled with the reopening of schools, will mean spending on PCs will fall off once the COVID pandemic has passed.
"Early indicators suggest strong PC shipments for education, enterprise, and consumer, muted somewhat by frozen SMBs," said Linn Huang, research vice president of devices and displays at IDC.
"With inventory still back ordered, this goodwill will continue into July. However, as we head deeper into a global recession, the goodwill sentiment will increasingly sour."
Gartner meanwhile claims that this growth will not continue beyond 2020, claiming that the market saw a surge in demand only to fill short-term business needs.
Lastly, Canalys' commentary included a line predicting that remote working and remote learning trends will continue beyond the pandemic, but stopped short of giving any predictions as to how the market will behave going into 2021.
Canalys did, however, claim that notebooks have "singlehandedly pulled the PC market out of depression", and that vendors will likely push investments to this category.
"The extraordinary demand has driven shifts in strategy across the industry. Chrome OS and AMD are making inroads into the commercial sector, while Apple MacBooks now run on ARM chips," said Canalys research director Rushabh Doshi.
"After years of smartphone-centered innovation, application developers, too, are turning their attention to the PC, where productivity and performance take precedence.