Amidst a more positive prediction that, compared to 2024, the global PC gaming hardware market "will grow 35% in 2025 to $44.5 billion", Jon Peddie Research also foresees a "significant decrease in entry-level PC gaming over the next five years."
Dr. Jon Peddie, the research centre's president, explains: "We are forecasting a significant decrease in entry-level PC gaming over the next five years, with a projected reduction of the entry-level PC gamer population by approximately 13%. Included in this drop are over 10 million people leaving the PC platform entirely. Consoles, handhelds, and mobile all offer compelling value for the budget-limited gamer."
It's not all down to people upping and leaving, though: "A few million entry-level defectors are not actually leaving the PC platform but are migrating to the more expensive hardware tiers of midrange and high-end PC hardware."
JPR seems to put at least some of this down to the impending ending of support for Windows 10:
"Never before in the history of the Microsoft Windows operating system has there been a forced hardware migration requirement. And this cannot be solved by swapping out a graphics card. It requires a CPU upgrade for over 100 million gamers, which, in turn, requires a motherboard upgrade and most likely RAM as well.
"We are observing that most PC gamers are simply buying new prebuilt systems. The DIY gamers are also prepared for this transition, and many have been building new computers alongside their existing Windows 10 PCs, instead of trying to Frankenstein their current systems. This allows them to continue using their PC until their Windows 11 builds are complete."
JPR is here referring to the fact that Windows 11 has stricter hardware requirements than Windows 10. Windows 11 officially requires TPM 2.0, something that only relatively newer CPUs and motherboards support, which gives an additional layer of hardware- or firmware-level security.
As such, those who are using an old system with Windows 10 installed will have to upgrade their entire hardware platform if they want to upgrade in an official and standard way to Windows 11 and keep their OS up to date.
These older systems will, by today's standards, most likely be entry-level ones. This is why JPR predicts a "significant decrease" in gaming on such systems, as many who feel forced to upgrade to get onto Windows 11 will "migrate to the more expensive hardware tiers of midrange and high-end PC hardware."
Much depends on how we're defining "entry-level", "midrange", and "high-end" here, of course. In the current market, even with many GPU prices seeming to return to MSRP, it's hard not to grimace at calling any piece of current-gen or previous-gen hardware "entry-level." Still, that's the reality.
It's worth noting, though, that Windows 10 gamers don't have to upgrade their hardware to get onto Windows 11. You can just modify the Windows 11 install file a little to skip the TPM requirement check, or edit a couple of registry keys to the same effect. I'm not sure whether JPR has accounted for the possibility that some Windows 10 gamers might do that.
Whatever the case, the forecast for the overall PC hardware market outlook is good: Up from less than $34 billion in 2024 to over $44 billion in 2025, $46 billion in 2026, and then around those $44–46 billion levels for the couple of years thereafter. That's much better than it going the other way.
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