GPU shipments continued to slide in Q1, but the bleeding is almost over

[Shawn Knight]

The big picture: PC GPU shipments reached 54.8 million units in the first quarter of 2023. It is a respectable number at face value but not so much when you consider that is a dip of 43 percent compared to the same period a year ago and a drop of 14 percent quarter over quarter. The 14 percent dip is well below the 10-year average of 6.1 percent according to Jon Peddie Research.

Desktop graphics solutions shipments dipped 40 percent year over year, and notebook GPU shipments slid 45 percent. Discrete graphics cards for desktops slid 12.6 percent compared to last quarter.

Intel saw the biggest decline in quarterly GPU shipments, down 17.5 percent in the first quarter compared to the previous quarter. AMD saw shipments decrease by 7.8 percent quarter over quarter while Nvidia shipments slid 4.1 percent sequentially. As for market share, Intel's slid 2.9 percent, AMD's share increased 0.9 percent and Nvidia's share went up by 1.96 percent.

The CPU market did not fare much better. According to Jon Peddie Research's report, the overall PC CPU market fell 15.6 percent compared to last quarter and a whopping 38.8 percent versus Q1 2022. The tablet market was unchanged quarter over quarter with a zero percent change in shipments.

Jon Peddie, president of JPR, said suppliers believe they have finally worked their way through excess inventory, adding that normal seasonality should take over by the second half or by the end of the year at the very latest. Among the big three GPU suppliers, Peddie said Nvidia has done the best job of clearing out inventory.

The GPU Market Finally Gives In, Nvidia Prices Drop

JPR expects a continuation of low sales in the second quarter followed by a cautious but slight upturn in the third quarter and the fourth quarter.

JPR also has full reports on the state of the graphics add-in board market and the overall PC gaming hardware market for those interested in digging deeper.

Image credit: Yan Krukau

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https://www.techspot.com/news/98899-gpu-shipments-continued-slide-q1-but-bleeding-almost.html

 

[LetTheWookieWin]

Perhaps it’s just me, but other than seasonal events (I.e. back to school and Christmas), I’m having a hard time seeing anything driving an uptick in demand.

The latest generation of GPUs are nothing revolutionary and their pricing sucks relative to features (esp VRAM capacity). Intel and AMD’s latest CPUs are basically evolutionary upgrades over the previous generation. Plus, we’re now hearing that Intel will release “Rocket Lake refresh” as 14th gen rather than the new meteor lake microarchitecture, while Zen 5 is likely a 2024 release.

If I were looking to build a PC, I’d still wait for better deals or a new microarchitecture with significant performance gains.

 

[Dr Roboto]

I think that GPU prices are still too high for most consumers, but I don't expect them to change much. I expect the GPU market will be pretty flat and sad for gamers. My real hope is that AMD and Intel get it together and dethrone Nvidia, but I just don't think the PC gaming market is the driver that it once was. My 1070 Ti still plays all the latest games even at 1440p, so no rush for me, and I would bet most others are in the same boat. With PlayStation and Xbox able to provide stunning graphics, you don't really need a PC based GPU to enjoy the latest and greatest.

 

[Julnor]

Games have always driven hardware and not the other way around. I know the last few years we have a vocal group on the internet that insist it's the opposite, but as is always the case the vocal minority don't speak for the silent majority despite their self belief that they do. The internet does not reflect the real world, the people that are the loudest on the internet tend to be extremists and an ostracized minority.

I expect PC components to continue to decline in sales and of course thus pricing. All markets are cyclical, this market enjoyed a strong bull period, an excessive one if anything, one that I profited off of thankfully, but there is just no easy guarantee in anything in business or life really. Obviously there was going to be a decline and bear period and that's going to happen, it's inevitable. Thousands of years of human history and behavior have shown this, it's not going to change now.

 

[kiwigraeme]

I think that GPU prices are still too high for most consumers, but I don't expect them to change much. I expect the GPU market will be pretty flat and sad for gamers. My real hope is that AMD and Intel get it together and dethrone Nvidia, but I just don't think the PC gaming market is the driver that it once was. My 1070 Ti still plays all the latest games even at 1440p, so no rush for me, and I would bet most others are in the same boat. With PlayStation and Xbox able to provide stunning graphics, you don't really need a PC based GPU to enjoy the latest and greatest.

There has to be a flattening in the emerging market as their economies tighten - those folks have seen hardships and know maybe to be careful . In developed countries - the well off , well paid are still here - but who upgrades every cycle - well off hate selling to unknowns on ebay anyway ) Mostly IMHO - the young now have higher rents , mortgage payments - still leaves those living at Mum and Dads and "free" student loans I suppose

 

[toooooot]

There has to be a flattening in the emerging market as their economies tighten - those folks have seen hardships and know maybe to be careful . In developed countries - the well off , well paid are still here - but who upgrades every cycle - well off hate selling to unknowns on ebay anyway ) Mostly IMHO - the young now have higher rents , mortgage payments - still leaves those living at Mum and Dads and "free" student loans I suppose

I was tempted to take a student loan. I was not sure I could pay it off due to some personal reasons, and I did not. I would take it if I knew it could be free...

 

[magisys]

Until we see only cosmetic effects patches for games already on the market, that kills the performance of high end card and actually are only a graphic benchmark, I can't really see anithing useful in pc gaming hardware upgrades. New games are mostly poor made console ports, many other games play fine without latest gen hardware in midrange configuration and 1080p (yesterday I was playing NFS Unbound on a Broadwell 5775C + 1080 GTX at 60fps...). If you are not into indifenitely replay game like CP2077 only to watching ad the gorgeous graphics, well, with the prices of today GPUs, motherboard and monitors, it's understandable that the market is contracting.

 

[3ogdy]

Look here, I couldn't give a duck about ray tracing. Certainly not gonna give a duck about it when it makes the already expensive GPUs even more so. Therefore, in these crazy times, raster performance is where it's at. Oh, and 8GB cards don't suffice.

x60 cards must be around $200 instead of $300
x70 cards must be around $350 instead of $600
x80 cards must be around $500 instead of $1200

We're getting tired of the whole mining craze and their excuses for astronomical prices.
I mean, they ask $600 for an x70 card and then wonder why sales aren't doing very well...

Sure, great performance gains come with bad prices for consumers, but if consumers are smart enough, they'll buy according to pricing, instead of following the naming scheme.

 

[Nobina]

Every year there is less incentive to buy a new GPU when games aren't even good. Most games just focus on graphics and they use raytracing, THAT is the selling point, which just tells you they've got nothing better to offer. Games are becoming virtual reality demos rather than being just...games.

 

[kiwigraeme]

There has to be a flattening in the emerging market as their economies tighten - those folks have seen hardships and know maybe to be careful . In developed countries - the well off , well paid are still here - but who upgrades every cycle - well off hate selling to unknowns on ebay anyway ) Mostly IMHO - the young now have higher rents , mortgage payments - still leaves those living at Mum and Dads and "free" student loans I suppose

When I was young and naive - went to Uni - work hard in holidays - saved a lot - didn't need student loans - was an out of towner - and not a well of family - never hungry - but hand me down clothes that kind of thing.

Student loans had zero interest - you could get easily over 10% in bank on deposits -
I thought it was not OK for rich students to take loans - solely to generate free income - many of those rich kids lied they were not living with their parents in the "big"city to get the free accommodation grant - I got it as was out of town
Cynical me now would have taken those loans to get Free interest returns - would not have lied about out of town though if lived with my parents - ( there were rules - over 20 they took you at face value you lived away from parents - some under 20 students lied - saying untenantable to live with parents for whatever reason ( kicked out - made to do chores and beaten senseless every night - can't remember criteria ) )

Weird thing was students who partied too hard in first year and lost accommodation grants could go on unemployment - still go to Uni ( write now they only wanted a rocket research job - fail every job interview ) - they got an extra $120 a week vs $70 for out of town students - in 1983 rent for a room in share student house $25 each or less , $20 food kitty each New Zealand dollars - so still money for a few beers, takeaways, petrol in motorcycle

 

[KIAg1978]

Gpu pricing is still out of the market so our people ,war,financial crisis and taxes don't leave any space for overpriced hardware with no real world use ,not even for real world games ,everyone says 8gb of memory is not enough, that's funny ,it is more than enough for the majority of today's games ,ultra graphics settings when playing is not a big difference from high settings ,8 is just fine ,when all consumers get a 55 inch super 4k monitor than uou could say that you might need something like 4090,4080 or even 4070 BUT NOT IN THIS PRICE, HELL NO!!

 

[passwordistaco]

GPU makers in 2020-21: "We set high prices because of high demand."

GPU makers in 2023: "Demand has crashed, so we must set high prices to maintain our margins from 2 years ago."