PC monitor sales fell 5.9% in 2022. If that doesn't sound like a catastrophic number, the final quarter of 2022 was the worst quarter on record, down 18.3% from the same period in 2021. Yes, the latest data is pretty ugly.

This is all according to market data sniffers at analyst group IDC (open in new tab), which reported total PC monitor shipments of just over 30.5 million units in Q4 2022, the lowest since IDC started tracking the market in 2008.

The decline in the PC monitor market of course reflects declines in CPUs (open in new tab) and graphics cards (open in new tab) IDC says this contraction was expected in two ways. First, the unstable global economic environment; and second, the pandemic, which spiked demand for telecommuting and gaming hardware, led to the decline in shipments.

IDC predicts that the market will shrink another 9.8% in 2023 before recovering in 2024, and that overall it will deteriorate again; looking at IDC's graphs overall, the declines in 2022 and 2023 are fairly mild, especially considering the large spikes during the pandemic.

So let's not panic: 120 million PC monitors are still trying to find homes in 2023. The world is still turning.

By the way, if you're wondering who the big players in PC monitors are, IDC has the numbers. Dell is by far the largest with about 22.5% of the market, with HP in second place with about 12%, followed closely by Samsung, Lenovo, and TPV.

Of course, this is the entire PC monitor market, not just gaming panels. In any case, some decline is not a big surprise. And as we recently found out with ASRock's new 34-inch ultrawide panel (opens in new tab), a really good gaming monitor doesn't have to be super expensive.