AMD records its highest server market share in decades — Intel fights back in client PCs

AMD enjoyed another great quarter in Q2 2024 as it gained share in data center and laptop CPU markets, according to a new report from CPU market tracker Mercury Research . Still, Intel gained share in desktops and continues to lead in terms of units in general.

(Image credit: AMD/Mercury Research)

Intel continued to dominate the client PC market in the second quarter of 2024, securing a 78.9% market share, while AMD held 21.1%. This outcome is expected, considering the strength and variety of Intel's client product lineup. Still, AMD managed to increase its unit share by 0.5% sequentially and by 3.8% year-over-year. Despite AMD's ongoing success, it will likely take the company years to achieve the sales growth needed to fully shift the market in its favor, not only because Intel dominates corporate PC sales but also because of Intel's access to vast production capacity.

Desktop PC, Mobile, Client Revenue / Unit Share

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Desktop CPUs via Mercury Research
Row 0 - Cell 0 2Q24 1Q24 4Q23 3Q23 2Q23 1Q23 4Q22 3Q22 2Q22 1Q22 4Q21 3Q21 2Q21 1Q21 4Q20 3Q20 2Q20 1Q20 4Q19 3Q19 2Q19 1Q2019 4Q18 3Q18 2Q18 1Q18 4Q17 3Q17 2Q17 1Q17 4Q16 3Q16
AMD Desktop Unit Share 23.0%23.9%19.8%19.2%19.4%19.2%18.6%13.9%20.5%18.3%16.2%17.0%17.1%19.3%19.3%20.1%19.2%18.6%18.3%18%17.1%17.1%15.8%13%12.3%12.2%12.0%10.9%11.1%11.4%9.9%9.1%
Quarter over Quarter / Year over Year (pp) -1% / +3.6+4.1 / +4.7+0.6 / +1.2-0.2 / +0.5+0.1 / -1.02+0.6 / +0.9+4.7 / +2.4-6.6 / -3.1+2.2 / +3.4+2.1 / -1.0-0.8 / -3.1-0.1 / -3.1-2.3 / -2.1+0.1 / +0.7-0.8 / +1.0+0.9 / +2.1+0.6 / +2.1+0.3 / +1.5+0.3 / +2.4+0.9 / +5Flat / +4.8+1.3 / +4.9+2.8 / +3.8+0.7 / +2.1+0.1 / +1.2+0.2 / +0.8+1.1 / +2.1-0.2 / +1.8-0.3 / -+1.5 / -+0.8 / --

AMD lost 1% of market share to Intel in desktop PCs in the second quarter of 2024 and now controls 23%, leaving 77% to Intel. Considering that AMD was preparing to release its all-new Zen 5-based CPUs for desktops in August, we doubt the company was too aggressive with stuffing the channel with its previous-generation Zen 4-based offerings, which might be one of the reasons why the company lost a small chunk of the market to its rival. Then again, when compared to the second quarter of 2023, AMD gained a 3.6% share in Q2 2024, which is quite a good result.

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Mobile CPUs via Mercury Research
Row 0 - Cell 0 2Q24 1Q24 4Q23 3Q23 2Q23 1Q23 4Q22 3Q22 2Q22 1Q22 4Q21 3Q21 2Q21 1Q21 4Q20 3Q20 2Q20 1Q20 Q419 3Q19 2Q19 1Q2019 4Q18 3Q18 2Q18
AMD Mobile Unit Share 20.3%19.3%20.3%19.5%16.5%16.2%16.4%15.7%24.8%22.5%21.6%22.0%20.0%18.0%19%20.2%19.9%17.1%16.2%14.7%14.1%13.1%12.2%10.9%8.8%
Quarter over Quarter / Year over Year (pp) +1 / +3.8-1 / +3.10.8 / 3.92.9 / 3.80.3 / -8.3-0.2 / -6.3+0.8 / -5.1-9.1 / -6.4+2.3 / +4.8+0.9 / +4.4-0.4 / +2.6+2.0 / +1.8+1.9 / +0.01-1.0 / +1.1-1.2 / +2.8+0.3 / +5.5+2.9 / +5.8+0.9 / +3.2+1.5 / +4.0+0.7 / +3.8+1.0 / +5.3+0.9 / ? Row 2 - Cell 23 Row 2 - Cell 24 Row 2 - Cell 25

On the laptop front, AMD made gains both sequentially and year-over-year. The company commanded 20.3% of x86 processors for laptops in Q2 2024: this is 1% higher than in the first quarter of this year and 3.8% higher than in the same quarter a year ago.

Apparently, even the upcoming launch of Zen 5-based Ryzen AI and Copilot+ and the AI PC frenzy are not expected to lower demand for AMD's existing offerings for notebooks , which is why PC makers accelerated purchases of these products. Another reason for AMD's success could be Intel's issues with supplying enough Meteor Lake PCs.

Still, AMD does not seem to have sold many expensive ('expensive' does not mean highest-end, though) Ryzen CPUs. Its laptop CPU revenue share is 17.7%, which is well below its 20.3% unit market share. Again, AMD's position improved as it increased its revenue share by 2.8% compared to the second quarter of this year and by a rather noticeable 4.5% compared to the second quarter of 2023.

Server Revenue / Unit share

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Server CPUs via Mercury Research
Row 0 - Cell 0 1Q24 1Q24 4Q23 3Q23 2Q23 1Q23 4Q22 3Q22 2Q22 1Q22 4Q21 3Q21 2Q21 1Q21 4Q20 3Q20 2Q20 1Q20 4Q19 3Q19 2Q19 1Q2019 4Q18 3Q18 2Q18 4Q17
AMD Server Unit Share 24.1%23.6%23.1%23.3%18.6%18%17.6%17.5%13.9%11.6%10.7%10.2%9.5%8.9%7.1%6.6%5.8%5.1%4.5%4.3%3.4%2.9%3.2%1.6%1.4%0.8%
Quarter over Quarter / Year over Year (pp) +0.5 / + 5.6+0.5 / +5.6-0.2 / 5.54.7 / 5.80.6 / 4.7+0.4 / +6.3+0.1 / +6.9+3.6 / +7.3+2.3 / +4.4+0.9 / +2.7+0.5% / +3.6+0.7 / +3.6+0.6 / +3.7+1.8 / +3.8+0.5 / +2.6+0.8 / +2.3+0.7 / +2.4+0.6 / 2.2+0.2 / +1.4+0.9 / +2.7+0.5 / +2.0-0.3 / -+1.6 / 2.4+0.2 / - Row 2 - Cell 25 Row 2 - Cell 26

AMD's biggest success for the second quarter probably lies in the server space. The company has managed to capture another 0.5% share away from Intel and now controls 24.1% of the data center CPU market with its EPYC CPUs. When compared to the second quarter of 2024, AMD's gain looks even more impressive, as the company grabbed 5.6% from Intel.

Although Intel is an indisputable leader when it comes to volumes, as it still controlled some 75.9% of datacenter CPU shipments in the second quarter, it is necessary to note that AMD seems to lead in high-end crème-de-la-crème machines that require the most powerful and expensive processors, as we can conclude from the financial results of the two companies in Q2 2024. While Intel earned $3.0 billion selling 75.9% of data center CPUs (in terms of units), AMD earned $2.8 billion selling 24.1% of server CPUs (in terms of units), which signals that the average selling price of an AMD EPYC is considerably higher than the ASP of an Intel Xeon.

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Indeed, AMD's revenue share of the server market in Q2 2024 was 33.7%, as calculated by AMD itself based on data from Mercury Research. That is up 0.7% QoQ and 6.6% YoY, an impressive result. Then again, Intel has nothing to offer against AMD's 96-core and 128-core processors for now, so AMD controls the market for high-end servers.

Contributing Writer

Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends.