Gartner forecast in October 2024 that worldwide IT spending would reach $5.747 trillion in 2025, a 9.3% increase from its 2024 estimate of $5.260 trillion. That was a forecast vintage, not a final tally: Gartner revised its 2025 estimate several times afterward. The original forecast pointed to data center systems and software as the fastest-growing categories, with GenAI infrastructure and related business projects among the expected drivers.
What Gartner’s 9.3% forecast measured
Gartner’s October 23, 2024 forecast covered worldwide spending across data center systems, devices, software, IT services and communication services. Its total was $5.747317 trillion for 2025, up 9.3% from its estimate for 2024. The figures below are Gartner’s October 2024 estimates, not observed final spending.
| Category | 2025 estimated spending | Estimated growth |
|---|---|---|
| Data center systems | $367.171 billion | 15.5% |
| Devices | $805.722 billion | 9.5% |
| Software | $1.239779 trillion | 14.0% |
| IT services | $1.737754 trillion | 9.4% |
| Communication services | $1.596890 trillion | 4.4% |
| Overall IT | $5.747317 trillion | 9.3% |
Data center systems had the highest projected growth rate, while IT services was the largest category by projected spending. The dollar totals and growth rates are distinct measures: the category with the fastest percentage growth was not the biggest market.
Why Gartner expected spending to rise
GenAI infrastructure and data centers
Gartner said that, at the time, GenAI spending was concentrated among technology companies building the infrastructure to supply AI services. It expected data center systems spending to rise by 15.5% in 2025 and add nearly $50 billion that year. Gartner also said the category had grown nearly 35% in 2024.
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Servers were a prominent part of that outlook. Gartner expected server sales to increase from more than $134 billion in 2023 to $332 billion by 2028, including more than $257 billion in 2025. Those were sales forecasts cited in the October 2024 release, not confirmed results.
Software and IT services
Gartner projected 14% growth in software spending, to about $1.23 trillion, and 9.4% growth in IT services, to about $1.73 trillion. It connected some of the expected increase to AI-related projects, including email and authoring tools. For those products and services, Gartner estimated an addition of $6.6 billion to global spending in 2024 and $7.4 billion in 2025, partly attributed to GenAI.
Enterprise adoption was expected to extend beyond pilots
Gartner analyst John-David Lovelock said current GenAI spending was predominantly from technology companies building supply-side infrastructure. He expected CIOs to move beyond proof-of-concept work and spend on GenAI starting in 2025. But Gartner also cautioned that organizations’ expectations could exceed what current models could deliver, and that the state of CIOs’ data could limit results. The forecast therefore reflected both investment in infrastructure and an anticipated, more measured expansion of business use.
How Gartner’s 2025 estimates changed
The 9.3% figure belongs specifically to Gartner’s October 2024 forecast. Gartner changed its estimate as it published later outlooks; those revisions should not be combined as though they were a single final reported result.
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| Forecast publication | 2025 spending estimate | Estimated growth |
|---|---|---|
| October 23, 2024 | $5.747 trillion | 9.3% |
| January 21, 2025 | $5.61 trillion | 9.8% |
| July 15, 2025 | $5.43 trillion | 7.9% |
| April 22, 2026 | $5.564 trillion | 10.5% |
| July 27, 2026 | $5.577 trillion | 10.7% |
Each row is the estimate reported in that publication, not an independently verified actual total. Gartner’s July 2025 outlook described a pause in net-new spending amid uncertainty, alongside continued investment in AI-related infrastructure. Its January 2025 release said price increases in recurring spending could absorb some of CIOs’ budget growth. The later 2026 releases also listed estimates for 2025, but the public figures cited here do not establish a definitive final actual total.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How to interpret the forecast
Gartner said its public methodology relied heavily on sales analysis from more than a thousand vendors across IT products and services, combining primary research with secondary sources. The full Market Databook was described as available to Gartner clients; the public release did not expose the complete model and assumptions. That makes the October headline useful as a dated market outlook, but not as a precise measure of what organizations ultimately spent.
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For personal-finance readers, the figure is a broad industry forecast—not a measure of household technology bills, a personal budgeting benchmark or, by itself, evidence that a particular technology investment will pay off. Its most durable takeaway is about the expectation Gartner expressed in October 2024: GenAI-related infrastructure would help lift IT spending, especially data center systems, while the amount and timing of actual business adoption remained uncertain.
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