14 DAY TRIAL // The sales of Windows PCs, including notebooks, skyrocketed in the first quarter of 2021 as compared to the same period a year ago, according to a new report this week.
More specifically, device makers worldwide sold a total of 49.8 million Windows PCs in Q1 2021, up from 30.1 million units in the first quarter of 2020. The 66 percent growth is obviously the result of more people working remotely and therefore needing ways to remain productive.
The demand for Chromebooks has also increased substantially, as sales jumped from 4.4 million units to no less than 12.1 million units. This is a 174% increase, showing that Chrome OS is becoming a worthy Windows rival, especially in the enterprise. And then, macOS devices also jumped 94 percent to go from 2.9 million units to 5.7 million units.
Demand for Chromebooks skyrocketing
Overall, the global PC shipments reached 68.2 million units in the first quarter, according to Strategy Analytics, an 81 percent increase from 37.8 million units a year before.
“Chromebooks continued to dominate the education sector as primary education sector demand is still high in developed markets. The SMB market is also responding well to the cost competitiveness and manageability of the Chrome ecosystem, giving the OS a growing share of shipments in this segment and giving vendors a crucial chance to slowly raise prices and add features for the SMB/commercial world,” Chirag Upadhyay, Industry Analyst, said.
When it comes to notebooks alone, Windows was by far the preferred choice, as it accounted for 73 percent of the devices sold during the quarter. Chrome OS was the runner-up with 17.7 percent, followed by macOS with 8.4 percent.
But the bad news for Microsoft is that this percentage of total sales has actually declined from 79.6 percent a year before, while Chrome’s score increased from no less than 11.7 percent.