Each year brings a series of world-changing events that make 2019 seem like a distant memory. This has unfolded in the PC and broader tech industry to the tune of chip shortages and a general industry slowdown. Now, judging from several industry reports on motherboard shipments, it appears that the PC market (and by extension, the PC gaming market) may be making a comeback.

Digitimes (via IT Home) reports that “industry sources” say motherboard shipments will recover in late 2024. This is based on historical shipment information and projections for 2024. Aggregating these numbers, motherboard shipments by the four major motherboard vendors (Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, and ASRock) could reach 33,700,000 units by year-end.

This is consistent with other positive developments in the PC and component industry, including steady growth in PC sales and a 32% YoY increase in GPU sales in Q4 2023. One can now add motherboards to the list of PC components that appear to have returned to healthy waters.

To put these developments in perspective, just two years ago, in 2022, motherboard shipments by the four major motherboard manufacturers were 30% lower than in 2021, indicating a long-term decline impacted by the chip shortage caused by the pandemic and the lack of post-pandemic technology demand This is a long-term decline. Indeed, while there was a boom in 2021 and 2021, the PC and component market trough in 2022 was well below pre-pandemic levels.

After a few disruptive years, we have all seen a return to normalcy in the industry, with data reported by IT Home estimating a return to 2019 motherboard shipment levels before the major market swings of the past few years.

By the way, much of this may have to do with the upcoming Intel Arrow Lake and AMD Zen 5 CPUs. These processors will feature powerful NPUs for the AI workloads that are currently in vogue, perhaps quite significantly as far as the market is concerned.

What does this mean for us PC gamers: a healthier PC market will undoubtedly mean a healthier PC gaming market. According to basic economics, unless demand spikes, prices will tend to fall as supply increases.

Improvements in the market in one area, like motherboards, tend to spill over into other areas. For example, as more companies buy motherboards, more companies will buy all the other components that attach to those motherboards. In other words, demand will increase, manufacturers will make more money, and production will increase.

Call me an optimist, but the next few years could be good for PC gamers looking for new hardware.