Counterpoint Research says Q3 PC shipments fell to 57 million units and forecasts a 27% drop in Q4, with HP, Dell and Lenovo hit hardest.
The PC market just had its worst quarter in a while, and the cause is sitting inside the machines. Counterpoint Research says global PC shipments fell 21% year over year in the third quarter of 2026, to 57 million units, as pricier memory and other components pushed up the cost of new computers. The Verge picked up the figures, which Counterpoint calls preliminary.
Shipments also dropped 13.8% from the previous quarter. For context, The Verge notes that PC shipments had grown for more than two years straight until Q2 2026.
Who lost the most
Almost everyone fell, but not equally. Counterpoint's chart of year-over-year change by vendor shows:
- HP: down 31%
- Dell: down 25%
- Lenovo: down 23%
- Apple: down 11%
- ASUS: down 7%
- All other vendors combined: down 16%
Counterpoint says Apple and ASUS held up better than the market through what it calls differentiated product portfolios. The five named vendors together account for 76.7% of shipments.
It's a price problem, and the base year was strong
Counterpoint blames higher memory, SSD and chip costs, which The Verge says have lifted prices on everything from MacBooks to Raspberry Pis. Consumers took the hit hardest. Higher prices, Counterpoint says, made replacement purchases harder to justify, while business demand stayed relatively resilient thanks to fleet replacement and Windows migration. That wasn't enough to offset the drop.
The comparison is also unfair to this year. Q3 2025 had a lift from buyers rushing ahead of the Windows 10 support deadline, plus tariff-related inventory moves. Part of the 21% is simply a tough year-ago number.
There's a quieter effect too. Senior analyst Minsoo Kang said vendors are prioritising configurations that can better absorb component inflation, which leaves fewer affordable options for price-sensitive shoppers. The Verge adds that some companies are even reviving older parts like DDR4 memory and 4GB graphics cards to hold prices down.
No quick rebound
Counterpoint expects Q4 2026 shipments to fall 27% year over year, with 2027 broadly flat against 2026. Associate director David Naranjo put it bluntly: stabilization should not be mistaken for recovery.
Our take: a flat 2027 at a much lower volume is the real headline. Anyone waiting for a cheap-laptop bounce next year is betting against the forecast. And The Verge says smartphones are hurting too, with shipments at a 14-year low in the same quarter.
Picture credit: Counterpoint Research
