Apple’s Macs exceed PC industry growth
The latest PC Market data is beginning to ship, and the information once again confirms the extent of Apple’s huge Apple Silicon Mac turnaround with the Mac experiencing the strongest year-on-year growth in global PC shipments in Q2 2025.
This is really significant and reflects how Macs continue to build share across all sectors. The most recent IDC data shows Apple shipped 6.2m Macs globally, up 21.4% on the same quarter last year.
Outpacing the industry
That’s all good news, but what’s critical about this is that Apple’s growth outpaced all other PC manufacturers, driving Apple’s global market share to grow to 9.1 percent. While that’s still fourth place in terms of volume, it’s all the same significant, particulalry as Apple generates better marginsb than others with its superior products.
Apple’s 9.1 percent growth needs to be compared with the overall 6.5% industry growth, with performance particularly strong outside the US.
We expected the US market to cool down this quarter given the inventory buildup to begin the year, but what we’re witnessing here might highlight US PC demand slowing down in anticipation of the import tariffs looming deadline,” said Jean Philippe Bouchard, research vice-president with IDC’s Worldwide Mobile Device Trackers.
“Despite a flat US PC market, the rest of the world demonstrated an appetite for PCs, fueled by an aging installed base and by a steady transition to Windows 11.”
Hopefully to computers that work better, such as Macs.
Counting tariffs
All the same, tariffs and trade wars are an industry-wide concern.
“The supply side of the industry is doing its best to navigate the unknowns as no one wants to sit on their heels and potentially miss an opportunity, but at the same time it is very risky carrying inventory which is a possibility given the strong first half sell-in,” said Ryan Reith, group vice president with IDC’s Worldwide Device Trackers.
“The bigger concern is what overall demand looks like as we get late into Q3 and beyond. Price increases will likely be dispersed over time and geography depending on vendor strategy which can potentially lead to some attractive promotions as a way to clear inventory backups, which seems odd at a time when prices are expected to rise because of tariffs.”
Canalys agree
Data from Canalys agrees the position.
“Total shipments of desktops, notebooks and workstations grew 7.4% to 67.6 million units in Q2 2025. Notebook shipments (including mobile workstations) hit 53.9 million units, up 7% compared with a year ago. Shipments of desktops (including desktop workstations) rose 9% to 13.7 million units.
Apple saw 21.3% growth for 9.4% market share.
Lack of clarity
“The Trump administration’s evolving tariff policies continue to reshape global PC supply chains while casting significant uncertainty over market recovery,” said Ben Yeh, Principal Analyst at Canalys, now part of Omdia. “US imports of PCs have dramatically shifted away from China toward Vietnam as manufacturers seek to avoid potential tariffs. Although Trump’s reciprocal tariffs have been delayed again, this time to 1 August, and PCs currently remain exempt from tariffs regardless of origin, the underlying uncertainty persists.”
The recent US-Vietnam trade deal establishes a 20% tariff on Vietnamese goods and a 40% tariff on transshipped items. “What began as straightforward China avoidance has evolved into a complex regulatory maze.
The key question is whether PCs manufactured in Vietnam using Chinese components or through Chinese-controlled operations will be classified as transshipments and face the 40% tariff. With enforcement criteria still undefined, market players face the reality that supply chain diversification alone may not provide the cost stability they initially sought.”
International sales have never been so important
It is also important to note that each one of the top five PC makers will be impacted by the tariffs applied against their products, as for the most part all these systems and many, many of their components are manufactured outside the US.
That’s going to impact US PC sales, I think, which is why it’s so important Apple is seeing growth outside America – particularly as the company prepares to introduce new and even more powerful Macs in the weeks to come.
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