In the fourth quarter of 2018, Australia's PC market experienced a -2.5% year-on-year (YoY) decline in unit shipments, according to the latest IDC research.

This is a sharp departure from the very strong 2Q18 and 3Q18 results of YoY growth of 8.9% and 9.6% respectively.

The Australian PC market for the 2018 calendar year saw commercial devices grow 9.2% while consumer devices shrank -3.0%.

“Competition from mobile devices, the slow pace of innovation and improvement in mainstream PC devices, and a disappointing gaming graphics hardware refresh cycle are all contributing to the extended life span of the consumer PC device”, says IDC Australia market analyst Sean Ashari.

“For much of the year, the opposite trend was seen in commercial PC Device shipments that were encouraged by SMB Tax rebates, the looming Windows 7 End of Support deadline, and the growing adoption of the PC-as-a-service model. Organisations were hungry for devices, however, in 4Q18 a combination of the Intel CPU shortage and uncertainty in business conditions (resulting from the US-China Trade War, domestic spending decline) curtailed growth at the end of the year and broke a yearlong commercial growth trend.

IDC predicts that Australia's PC market in 2019 will decline at -3.0% YoY.

“Australia is expected to experience the continued decline in consumer PC shipments as a result of falling house prices, shrinking household savings, and uncertainty around interest rates”, says Ashari.

“In 2019, Government and exporting businesses are expected to increase spending on PC devices, while locally trading businesses face a slow decline in business confidence”.