Intel is still the biggest x86 processor maker by volume, but AMD is closing the gap faster than it has in decades. Mercury Research’s second-quarter 2026 data puts Intel’s global x86 share at 69.3%, its lowest since 1995, against AMD’s record 30.7%. The pressure is even sharper in servers: AMD reaches 34.5% by the conventional count, and Mercury estimates it would hit 46.4% if the two companies counted certain data center processors the same way.
The x86 market in 20 seconds
- Intel drops to 69.3% of the x86 market, and AMD reaches a peak of 30.7%.
- In servers, Mercury officially reports AMD at 34.5%, against 65.5% for Intel.
- Adjusted for accounting differences, AMD would reach 46.4% and Intel 53.6%.
- Intel is growing revenue strongly, but AMD is growing shipments even faster.
The snapshot is interesting because Intel’s slide in share comes alongside a strong recovery in its business. The company reported $16.1 billion in Q2 revenue, up 25% year over year, with its Data Center and AI division reaching $6.3 billion, a 59% jump.
AMD isn’t just growing at the expense of a weakened rival. Its quarterly revenue rose 50% to a record $11.536 billion, and its data center division more than doubled sales to $6.718 billion, up 107% from a year earlier, driven by demand for EPYC processors and Instinct accelerators.
The paradox is clear: the server market is expanding, Intel is selling much more than a year ago, and AMD keeps taking share anyway.
AMD reaches 34.5% of server processors
Per Mercury Research, server processor shipments grew nearly 20% year over year in Q2 2026.
AMD gained the most from that.
It hit a 34.5% unit share, 7.3 percentage points higher than a year earlier and 1.3 points above the previous quarter. Intel holds 65.5%.
That’s already a big shift from a few years ago, when Xeon dominated most enterprise data centers almost unopposed.
But Mercury adds a more striking second angle.
AMD and Intel don’t classify all data center processors the same way.
AMD counts certain networking and storage chips within its Embedded business, while Intel puts similar products in its Data Center division.
Dean McCarron, president of Mercury Research, estimates that if you strip out that difference to compare only equivalent markets, AMD would have about 46.4% of the server CPU market and Intel 53.6%.
In that adjusted count, AMD gained 9.2 percentage points in a year and 2.9 points in the last quarter alone.
Don’t mix the two numbers up. The 34.5% is the conventional published server share, while 46.4% is Mercury’s normalized estimate correcting for how Intel and AMD classify products.
Other analyses point the same way. Jon Peddie Research (JPR) puts AMD at roughly 33.4% of server CPU units in Q2 2026, up from 27% a year earlier. The small differences come from methodology and which products are counted.
Intel drops below 70% of the x86 market
The change isn’t limited to data centers.
Mercury Research puts Intel’s combined share of x86 processors for PCs and servers (excluding semi-custom, embedded, and IoT) at 69.3% in Q2.
That’s the first time since 1995 Intel has fallen below 70%.
AMD hits a record 30.7% in the same measure.
Against Q2 2025, Intel has lost 6.5 points and AMD has gained exactly that.
Add in semi-custom, embedded, and IoT processors and the split shifts a little: Intel drops to 65.9% and AMD rises to 34.1%. AMD’s large semi-custom business in console chips helps that count.
The trend shows in PCs too.
AMD holds a combined 30.3%, against 69.7% for Intel. In desktops, Ryzen chips hold 34.9% of units, while Intel accounts for 65.1%.
In laptops the gap is wider, but AMD is growing faster. Its share reaches 28.9%, up 8.4 points from a year earlier, while Intel keeps 71.1%.
The desktop market itself looked very different. Shipments fell more than 20% year over year in the quarter, hit by high prices and component shortages. AMD sold fewer desktop processors too, but its drop was smaller than Intel’s, so it still gained share.
Intel sells more servers, but AMD grows even faster
Losing share doesn’t necessarily mean selling fewer units.
That distinction is key to understanding Intel right now.
The company just posted one of its strongest recent growth stretches. Total revenue rose 25% year over year to $16.1 billion, with the Data Center and AI division up 59% to $6.3 billion.
Intel credits part of the gain to AI-related demand and has admitted it needs to ramp production quickly to fill orders.
It also launched Xeon 6+ during the quarter, its first server processor made on Intel 18A technology.
Intel’s problem is that the market is growing faster around AMD.
AMD’s data center revenue reached $6.7 billion, up 107% year over year. That division now makes up about 58% of the company’s total revenue.
Not all of that is EPYC CPUs. The division also includes Instinct AI accelerators, whose weight is climbing fast. So comparing AMD’s $6.7 billion directly to Intel’s $6.3 billion in Data Center and AI doesn’t tell you which company sells more server processors.
Mercury’s data is more useful precisely because it tracks CPU shipments.
And it’s clear EPYC keeps gaining ground.
AMD has built advantages in core count, energy efficiency, and density per server across several generations, traits cloud providers and large data center operators especially value.
There’s also a renewal effect. A server can stay in service for five, seven, or more years, so fast technology shifts in PCs take much longer to show up in the data center installed base.
Intel and AMD now face another rival: Arm
The x86 fight isn’t happening in a closed market.
Intel and AMD are up against the rise of Arm-based processors, especially inside the big cloud providers.
Amazon Web Services keeps expanding its Graviton family. Google is building Axion, Microsoft has Cobalt, and NVIDIA has entered with its Vera CPU.
Apple showed in PCs that a full move from x86 to Arm was possible with its M-series chips. Qualcomm is trying to extend a similar model in Windows through Snapdragon.
So AMD reaching 30.7% of the x86 market doesn’t mean Intel and AMD will own every future CPU market.
Some of the growth could move to other architectures.
In data centers that’s especially relevant, because hyperscalers have enough volume to justify designing their own processors. If a custom CPU cuts infrastructure cost or power by even a few percentage points, savings that get huge across hundreds of thousands of servers, the impact is big.
Intel is trying to answer by reaching beyond Xeon sales. It’s chasing customers for Intel Foundry, offering custom silicon design, and working on new strategies for AI accelerators and inference.
AMD’s strategy is different. Alongside EPYC growth, it’s turning Instinct into a second major revenue line and preparing its Helios rack platform to compete in full AI systems.
The upshot is that the old Intel vs. AMD rivalry continues, but now inside a much wider market.
Intel still leads in x86 CPUs, and its financials show a real recovery. But the Q2 data sends a clear signal: AMD now sells roughly one in three x86 processors, and in some comparable server counts it’s close to half.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is AMD’s share of x86 processors?
Mercury Research puts AMD’s record share at 30.7% in Q2 2026, against 69.3% for Intel, excluding semi-custom, embedded, and IoT products.
Does AMD already have 46.4% of the server market?
Not in the standard measure. Its conventional share is 34.5%. Mercury estimates 46.4% after adjusting for differences in how AMD and Intel count certain networking and storage processors used in data centers.
Is Intel selling fewer server processors?
Losing share doesn’t necessarily mean selling fewer units. Total server CPU shipments grew nearly 20%, and Intel’s Data Center and AI revenue rose 59%. AMD has simply grown shipments faster.
Why is AMD taking share from Intel?
The growth ties to wider EPYC adoption in cloud and enterprise servers, along with competitive performance, core count, and efficiency. The trend also lines up with AMD expanding in laptops and desktops.
