The Five Biggest PC Makers Shipped 22.6 Percent Fewer Units. IDC's Headline Says 20.1.

Does a 20.1 percent drop in PC shipments mean what it sounds like? Mostly yes, but IDC's October 8, 2026 figure averages two different markets and sits on a baseline that has moved. IDC counted 62.7 million PCs shipped in the third quarter, against 78.5 million a year earlier. Its own release from October 2025 put that year-earlier quarter at 75.8 million.

Five brands carried the decline

Start with who shipped what. In IDC's table, HP Inc went from 15.0 million PCs in the third quarter of 2025 to 10.3 million, a 30.9 percent drop. Dell fell 25 percent to 7.6 million. Lenovo kept first place at 14.9 million but lost 22.6 percent. Together the three gave up 4.2 points of market share, which IDC suggests is the hangover from earlier stockpiling.

Apple and ASUS fell less than the market. Apple shipped 5.9 million, down 11.3 percent, and ASUS shipped 5.5 million, down 8.6 percent. Both ended with a larger share. That cuts against a story where every PC maker is equally stuck, and Omdia credits Apple's premium positioning for limiting the damage.

Add up the five and the arithmetic is plain. They shipped 44.2 million units against 57.1 million a year earlier, a decline of about 22.6 percent. That figure is Trestlewire's calculation from IDC's table, not a number IDC published. Everyone outside the top five shipped 18.4 million, down 14.0 percent, and that long tail is what pulls the blended headline back to 20.1.

The baseline moved

Here is the part the headline skips. In October 2025, IDC reported 75.8 million PCs for the third quarter of 2025, up 9.4 percent. This October it lists the same quarter at 78.5 million. The top five barely changed, 57.2 million then and 57.1 million now. The "Others" row went from 18.6 million to 21.4 million.

Measured against IDC's original figure, 62.7 million is a 17.3 percent drop, not 20.1 (Trestlewire's arithmetic again). The long tail's decline shrinks from 14.0 percent to about 1 percent. Restating a prior-year number is not misconduct. The release just does not say what changed, and 2.8 points of the headline rides on it. IDC also now lists the second quarter of 2026 as a 3.8 percent drop, after first reporting 4.9 percent.

Two firms, three identical vendor numbers

Omdia published a day later and counts differently. It puts the quarter at 58.1 million desktops, notebooks, and workstations, down 21.2 percent, which implies a year-ago base of about 73.7 million (our arithmetic). That is 4.6 million fewer PCs than IDC reports for the same three months. Yet Lenovo at 14.9 million, HP at 10.3 million, and Dell at 7.6 million match exactly between the two firms.

The gap lives elsewhere. Apple is 6.8 million at Omdia and 5.9 million at IDC. ASUS is 5.4 million versus 5.5 million. Subtract the five named vendors from each total and Omdia is left with roughly 13.1 million units outside the top five, while IDC has 18.4 million. So the two firms agree on the big brands and differ by about 5 million units on everyone else. That is the same row IDC revised. Neither release explains the difference, and both define the category as desktops, notebooks, and workstations.

What the analysts blame, and what they measured

Both firms point at memory. Omdia's Ben Yeh says DRAM and SSDs have gone from about 15 percent of a PC's cost to nearly 40 percent, with component price increases above fourfold. The fourfold figure describes memory and storage, not the sticker on a laptop. Omdia's Ishan Dutt adds that retailers reported double-digit increases in average selling prices while sales fell.

“we don't expect pricing anywhere near what it was a year ago”

Both also describe a pull-forward: vendors and buyers stocked up in the first half to beat price hikes, leaving the third quarter thin. That is the analysts' account. Neither release publishes inventory or channel stock data, so the size of the pull-in is inferred from the drop, not measured on its own.

Base rates help here. Ubrani said, in comments reported by Ars Technica, that IDC has recorded bigger quarterly declines, 28.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2022 and 28.7 percent in the first quarter of 2023, both coming off pandemic highs. Ars Technica also reports IDC calls this its biggest third-quarter drop on record. Both can be true, since a third quarter is normally the strong one.

What comes next

Omdia forecasts a 24 percent decline in the fourth quarter of 2026 and a further 7 percent in 2027. Those are forecasts, and Omdia's own wording is that the current drop may be the start of a new downward cycle. IDC expects PC prices to ease "only modestly and briefly," since channels are sitting on inventory.

The drop is real. The five big brands absorbed most of it, the exact size depends on whose long-tail count and whose baseline you trust. IDC expects prices to stay high, and Omdia expects the cost pressure behind them to persist.