Now that Q1 2024 is in the rear view, market analysis firm Mercury Research has updated its standings of the long-running battle between Intel and AMD for CPU market share. The firm's analysis of the current CPU landscape shows the company is steadily chipping away at Intel's market share thanks to its Ryzen desktop and Epyc server CPUs. Intel still holds the majority of market share in all markets compared to AMD, but the underdog is making significant progress against its much bigger rival, at least in desktop chips.
AMD PR shared Mercury Research's latest report on the CPU market to several media sites, including TweakTown. The paywalled report, which Mercury sells for thousands of dollars to paid subscribers, shows AMD's gains against Intel both in the last quarter and year-over-year, and they're sizable. For example, AMD now holds a 23% market share in the server market, up from 18% a year ago. The company made similar gains in desktop CPUs, from 19.2% market share a year ago to 23.9% in Q1 of 2024.
AMD also grabbed some market share from Intel in the mobile category, though it was slightly less than what it achieved with its desktop and server CPUs. Mercury's numbers show AMD going from 16.2% market share last year to 19.3%, for a gain of 3.1% overall. This category also shows the only drop in share quarter-to-quarter for AMD, as it lost 1% market share in mobile, the only blemish on an otherwise stellar report for AMD.
The report on AMD's progress in its long-running battle with Intel in the CPU market starkly contrasts its recent announcement of dismal sales of its Radeon GPUs. That aside, the company hopes to increase its CPU market share even further with its upcoming Zen 5 CPUs, which AMD has stated will be coming out later this year. Of course, neither Intel nor Nvidia are resting on their laurels, and AMD will face stiff competition across all segments. It'll be battling Nvidia's Blackwell chips, and Intel will be applying severe pressure on desktop and server with a slew of new CPUs that it hopes will reverse AMD's recent momentum. Qualcomm will also enter the mobile market later this year with its X Elite chips, a true wildcard entry.
