Apple shipped over half of all AI-capable PCs in 2024

[Redaktion]

Canalys, a market analysis company, released a report stating that 17% of all PCs shipped in 2024 were "AI-capable," which are computers with hardware dedicated for AI features. Of that 17%, Apple shipped over half, largely thanks to its M4 CPU.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Apple-shipped-over-half-of-all-AI-capable-PCs-in-2024.968569.0.html

[Harold]

Well there goes another pointless article about a dumb fact that doesn't mean s***. Considering that the M4 MacBooks didn't come out until the last 2 months of the year and Microsoft's Copilot Plus laptops didn't even start shipping until the second half of the the year. You are comparing sales numbers for laptops sold by Apple for the entire year to sales of windows ai pcs sold within the second half of the  year. Why not compare the laptops sold by Apple within H2 2024. Atleast it would be a fair comparison.

[GeorgeS]

While I'd agree that this was a fairly useless article based on useless numbers (not for the reasons someone else mentioned) and even more useless conclusion, just because OEM's are using CPU/APU's with NPU's embedded in them which CAN ALLOW AI to perform better locally than without an NPU, this does NOT EQUATE to "AI" use in PC's or its overall usefulness or adoption rate by consumers OF these PC's.

Sure OEM's driven/feed by Microsoft's "KoolAid" idea that adding "AI" to PC's will spark a "buying spree" by business's and consumers alike, however the REALITY is that even the multibillion dollar "AI Server Farms" have not come up with anything useful with AI so surely whatever business's and consumers run locally on their PC's (and even more comically their mobile devices) would be even MORE USELESS!!

Sure, some experimenters & researchers MIGHT BE PLAYING with LLM's on local hardware but the rater limited numbers those folks represent surely are not moving any 'adoption' needles anywhere. :)
 

[RobertJasiek]

"Apple shipped over half of all AI-capable PCs in 2024 [...] 17% of all PCs shipped in 2024 were 'AI-capable,' which are computers with hardware dedicated for AI features. Of that 17%, Apple shipped over half [...] AI-capable personal devices, such as smartphones and PCs. Apple appears to be leading the charge in this market, and by a wide margin. [...] Apple shipped more than half of all "AI-capable PCs," which are defined as personal computers with hardware dedicated for AI tasks, such as a neural processing unit (or NPU). In total, 17% of PCs shipped in 2024 met this definition, and of those, Apple shipped 54%. The Cupertino colossus was by far the leader in this market segment. [...] Windows laptops have somewhat lagged behind in this area."

Nothing but lies by Canalys reported and, furthermore, misrepresented by Sam Medley!

This whole story relies on the false premises that dGPUs etc. were not AI-capable and DIY desktops did not exist. However, dGPUs are extraordinarily much faster for AI than NPUs in SOCs.

The image of Canalys has a foot note defining "AI-capable PCs are desktops and notebooks with an NPU or equivalent AI-accelerator". Sam Medley misrepresents this by not mentioning NPUs and by pretending smartphones were included. Canalys's definition is flawed, in particular, because dGPUs are not "equivalent" AI-accelerators to NPUs - rather dGPUs are extraordinarily superior as to AI speed.

All this fake story conveys Apple as the AI market leader while in fact this is Nvidia and Apple is known to first have missed the AI train and now lags behind several years.

We do not want lies but we want to be informed correctly!

[Jonas Bee]

It says a lot more about the disastrous sales of AI computers in general and how uninterested most buyers are than how highly appreciated Apple's AI-capable computers are selling.

Sales in general are (way) down, volumes are low, Apple did sell most of the unappealing AI computers - big yay, I guess.