Double Figures

There used to be some certainty in the PC market. Microsoft and Windows would have a share of the market north of 90% and the rest would struggle at low single figure digits. 

That was the rule. Columnists would rank the Mac below that of PCs because of sales. Everyone had a PC. Everyone used Windows. Macs were too expensive, too incompatible, too niche. 

The world went mobile. The device in your pocket was your PC. Consumers gravitated to Google and Apple's mobile environment. The PC became one of the minority citizens in the consumer world. Microsoft withdrew from much of the consumer market to concentrate on enterprise products. 

Apart from the pandemic years PC sales have had a steady decline. Retail has reduced the space in electronics stores for the PC. Several traditional electronics stores have gone out of business. Meanwhile Apple have upped their retail offering. Apple Stores and sales points within stores have made the Apple buying experience superior to the lines of different PC brands on shelves. 

Pricing has changed. There is still a market for low priced PCs but consumers are now prepared to spend more in exchange for a longer cycle of ownership. 

Microsoft has chosen to make its products compatible with the Android mobiles using it's Your Phone application. The iPhone and iOS don't play well with Windows. 

As if to confirm the shift of the consumer market this year has the Apple Mac in double figures for market share. 

There are other things. Apple's M series of chips has embraced the low power world. The Intel processors in Windows are increasingly looking like the steam train in an all-electric world. 

Microsoft shouldn't feel too bad. It's a mega-corporation and has morphed to being a cloud services company. Apple are still a long way from parity with the PC in sales. However, its remarkable shift.