ASUS, GIGABYTE, MSI and ASRock cut 2026 motherboard shipment targets as DIY PC demand weakens
According to an original DigiTimes , Taiwan’s four main motherboard makers have lowered their 2026 shipment targets. The report says the DIY PC market is being hit by higher memory prices, CPU shortages, and lower demand for gaming PC upgrades.
DigiTimes claims memory costs have increased from around 15% to more than 30% of a PC bill of materials. PC brands are said to be responding with 10% to 20% price increases or weaker configurations.
Interestingly, the report also links weaker gaming demand to a slower NVIDIA GeForce upgrade cycle . DIGITIMES claims the RTX 50 series has not received further updates since the start of 2026, while the next-generation RTX 60 series is rumored to be delayed until 2028. This has reportedly reduced the incentive for gamers to build new systems.
| Motherboard Shipments 2025/2026 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Brand | 2025 shipments | 2026 target / estimate | YoY change |
| ASUS | 15.0 million | ~10.0 million | ~-33% |
| GIGABYTE | 11.5 million | 8.0-8.5 million | ~-26% to -30% |
| MSI | 11.0 million | 8.4 million | ~-24% |
| ASRock | 4.3 million | 2.7 million | ~-37% |
ASUS, which stays at the top of motherboard sales for years, is expected to ship around 5 million motherboards in the first half of 2026, but weaker second-half demand could put its full-year result close to 10 million units. Digitimes says this would be ASUS’s lowest motherboard shipment level since its 2008 split.
DigiTimes adds that ASUS, GIGABYTE and ASRock are all shifting more revenue focus toward AI server platforms, while consumer motherboards and graphics cards are expected to contribute less to growth in 2026.
Then where are the new CPUs?
While I’m sure RTX 50 price and lack of updates contributed to lower motherboard sales, the CPU vendors doing mostly nothing interesting these days are also to blame. Intel is not expected to launch any new SKU until Nova Lake, while AMD seems to be focused on enthusiasts/premium tier SKUs for now with Zen 6 arriving no sooner than the end of this year. If consumers are to upgrade, they will simply wait for cheaper memory/storage and actually something meaningful to upgrade to.
Source: DIGITIMES
