Windows 11, not AI, kick-started the PC upgrade cycle

If 2025 proved anything about PCs, it's that corporate IT will upgrade hardware out of necessity long before it does so out of AI-fueled excitement.

According to new figures from Gartner released on Tuesday, worldwide PC shipments into the channel jumped 9.3 percent in Q4 and ended the year up 9.1 percent overall, marking the first meaningful rebound after a bruising post-pandemic slump.

"This marks a significant turnaround following two years of steep decline in 2022 and 2023, and only modest gains in 2024," Gartner swooned.

The analyst says the recovery was driven by channel shipments into the commercial market, not by consumers piling into stores or a sudden rush for AI PCs. In practice, that mostly means companies replacing old machines that were already overdue for retirement. In other words, this was less about AI PCs and more about businesses discovering that a five-year-old laptop running ...