--- title: "How many computers are there in the world? roughly 2 billion p" description: "roughly 2 billion personal computers in use How the figure is estimated, how confident it is, and what makes the scale graspable." url: https://atoneplace.net/how-many/computers-in-the-world/ site: "At One Place" --- # How many computers are there in the world? **How many computers are there in the world?: roughly 2 billion personal computers in use** A modern phone processor outperforms every computer on Earth combined as of the early 1970s, which is roughly when the personal computer was being invented. Around 2 billion desktops and laptops are in active use, a figure that has been roughly flat for a decade because tablet and smartphone growth absorbed what would have been PC growth. Annual shipments run at about 250 to 300 million units against an installed base with a typical replacement cycle of five to six years, which is the arithmetic that fixes the total. If you count every device with a general-purpose processor the question dissolves — there are tens of billions of microcontrollers, several in every car and appliance. ## How the figure is arrived at Install-base modelling rather than counting. Take reported quarterly shipments by vendor, apply a survival curve describing how long a machine stays in use before retirement, and integrate. The survival curve is the soft part, and lengthening replacement cycles have repeatedly caused analysts to under-count the installed base. ## How confident it is - **Low estimate:** 1,500,000,000 - **High estimate:** 2,500,000,000 - **Spread:** 1.7× between the bounds ## Other things people built counts - [How many countries are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/countries/) — 195 — or 193, or 206, or 249, depending on who is counting - [How many cars are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/cars-in-the-world/) — about 1.5 billion motor vehicles - [How many planes are in the air right now?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/planes-in-the-air-right-now/) — roughly 10,000 to 20,000 at any moment - [How many languages are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/languages/) — about 7,150 living languages - [How many McDonald's are there?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/mcdonalds-restaurants/) — about 43,000 in over 100 countries - [How many phones are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/phones-in-the-world/) — about 8.9 billion mobile connections — more than there are people - [How many nuclear weapons are there?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/nuclear-weapons/) — about 12,200 warheads - [How many websites are there?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/websites/) — about 1.1 billion hostnames — but only around 200 million active - [How many books have ever been published?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/books-ever-published/) — about 130 million as of 2010 — probably over 200 million now - [How many airports are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/airports-in-the-world/) — about 45,000 with runways — but only around 4,000 with scheduled airline service - [How many ATMs are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/atms-in-the-world/) — about 3 million - [How many cities are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/cities/) — about 10,000 with over 50,000 people; 33 megacities over 10 million - [How many buildings are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/buildings-in-the-world/) — somewhere between 1.5 and 4 billion - [How many miles of road are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/roads-total-length/) — about 64 million km — roughly 40 million miles ## Common questions ### How many computers are there in the world? roughly 2 billion personal computers in use ### How is that estimated? Install-base modelling rather than counting. Take reported quarterly shipments by vendor, apply a survival curve describing how long a machine stays in use before retirement, and integrate. The survival curve is the soft part, and lengthening replacement cycles have repeatedly caused analysts to under-count the installed base. ## Related pages - [How many countries are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/countries/) - [How many cars are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/cars-in-the-world/) - [How many planes are in the air right now?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/planes-in-the-air-right-now/) - [How many languages are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/languages/) - [How many McDonald's are there?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/mcdonalds-restaurants/) - [How many phones are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/phones-in-the-world/) - [How many nuclear weapons are there?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/nuclear-weapons/) - [How many websites are there?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/websites/) - [How many people are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/people-alive-right-now/) - [How many stars are there in the universe?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/stars-in-the-universe/) - [How many bones are in the human body?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/bones-in-the-human-body/) - [How many grains of sand are there on Earth?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/grains-of-sand-on-earth/) - [How many ants are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/ants-on-earth/) - [How many trees are there in the world?](https://atoneplace.net/how-many/trees-on-earth/) ## Sources - Typical range compiled from manufacturer specifications — At One Place (/about/)