According to a new report by Jon Peddie Research, Q4 2021 sales of CPUs with integrated graphics were down 15% year-over-year. By contrast, sales of discrete graphics boards for desktops increased during the fourth quarter.
The industry shipped approximately 101 million discrete and integrated GPUs for PCs in Q4 2021*, which is an increase of around 0.8% sequentially (this essentially means flat), but a decrease of 15% year-over-year. By contrast, sales of standalone graphics cards for desktop PCs (such as those featured in the best graphics cards for gaming) reached around 13 million units in the fourth quarter of 2021, a 3% growth sequentially and an 18% surge from the same quarter in 2020.
Being the world's largest supplier of CPUs with built-in GPUs, Intel continued to lead the market in terms of GPU units sold as it retained control of 62% of the market. AMD and Nvidia controlled about 19% each. Meanwhile, AMD's shipments rose 4.7%, Intel's shipments increased 0.6%, and Nvidia's shipments dropped by 2.2%.
As for shipments of discrete GPUs for desktops and laptops, Nvidia had a market share of 81%, whereas AMD controlled 19% of the market. Intel did not report sales for its entry-level DG1 GPUs to Jon Peddie Research.
Discrete Desktops and Laptops GPU Shipment Market Shares
Q2 2020 | Q3 2021 | Q4 2021 | |
AMD | 18% | 17% | 19% |
Nvidia | 82% | 83% | 81% |
While demand for CPUs was down 21% YoY in Q4 2021 -- as PC makers were preparing for Intel's high-volume launch of 12th Generation Core 'Alder Lake' processors in Q1 2022 -- demand for discrete desktop graphics cards remained strong.
"Penetration of Nvidia's latest Ampere generation (with avg. ASP of $475, 15-80% above prior Turing/Pascal[generations]) is still just 15% of total Nvidia gamers (per Steam's January hardware survey), meaning there is still plenty of room for ASP expansion as Nvidia gamers upgrade to latest [generation] once SKUs become available (still completely sold out and re-selling at 2x MSRP)," wrote Vivek Arya, an analyst with Bank of America, in a note to clients (via SeekingAlpha). "We expect supply could remain constrained into the 2H 2022 which, in our view, could drive stronger for longer sales growth."
*Sales of graphics adapters — discrete and integrated — reported by JPR represents sell-in numbers, which means that the actual chips yet have to be sold to the end-user.