As a group, PC gamers in the United States are spending the equivalent of the Danish defense budget in 2020 on hardware and various supplies. That $4.5 billion spent on our favorite hobby is a 62% increase over the previous year, which partly explains why it's so hard to buy a graphics card right now. Because everyone wants to spend big bucks on new toys.

Now, we all know that events have happened in 2020 that make playing PC games at home a much more attractive prospect than in a normal year, but still, the statistics stack up to make for interesting reading. For a PC geek like me, that is.

A report published by the NPD Group (via Guru3D) highlights that PC gaming has grown significantly over the past 12 months. The biggest changes have clearly come from people spending more time on their machines and wanting to change the way they interact with their gaming PCs.

The amount spent on accessories such as gaming headsets and gaming keyboards increased by a whopping 81%.

This obviously does not fully explain the revenue growth, especially the actual amount spent on hardware, i.e., complete systems and components alone, which rose 57 percent. [The release of higher-priced parts like the Nvidia RTX 3080 and AMD Ryzen 9 5900X, as well as the lack of more affordable alternatives, will have an impact here. However, most of this sales increase will likely come from people buying entirely new gaming PCs and gaming laptops, rather than from the DIY upgrade market.

The growth of PC gaming as a hobby is not a big surprise, but the rate of growth might be. However, NPD cites the PC being the most accessible platform as a contributing factor.

"PC gaming is the most innovative, open, and content-diverse segment of the video game industry. It is also one of the most accessible segments because many households have a desktop or laptop computer," said Matt Piscatella, video game analyst for NPD. And it's one of the most accessible," says Matt Piscatella, video game analyst for NPD.

However, another statistic in the report surprised me. Given the growth in revenue and the significant increase in time spent playing PC games, one would have thought that more and more people would be taking up PC gaming as a hobby, but NPD claims that the number will only increase by 4% by 2020.

However, according to NPD, growth in 2020 was only 4%.