Gartner Forecasts Global AI Server Spending to Reach $957.2B in 2027

Gartner released a new forecast projecting that worldwide expenditures on artificial intelligence-optimized servers will reach $957.2 billion in 2027. That figure represents an increase of around 81% from $527.6 billion in 2026. The research firm expects overall global AI spending to expand 47.5% next year to $4.05 trillion, with infrastructure composing roughly 59%, or $2.4 trillion, of that total.

The research firm explained that faster-than-expected growth in inference workloads alongside heavy compute demands for model training are fueling hardware investments. Research leader John-David Lovelock stated that both dynamics are driving up AI infrastructure budgets globally. The company also pointed to neocloud and hyperscaler capacity additions and higher server costs driven by memory pricing. Gartner previously noted that relief from memory price spikes was improbable prior to late 2027, with Lovelock indicating that memory inflation could last into 2030.

In other categories, Gartner anticipates outlays on AI agents and assistants will jump from $30 billion in 2026 to $67 billion in 2027. AI cybersecurity outlays are projected to climb around 69% from $51 billion to $86 billion, while spending on generative AI models is expected to rise 82% to $51 billion. AI software expenditures are forecasted to climb 42% to $649 billion, alongside a 29.5% increase in services spending to $746 billion. However, Gartner previously warned that more than $3.5 trillion in infrastructure outlays could face impairment by 2030 if monetization fails to cover planned capital investments.

The spending forecast follows Gartner's earlier unveiling of strategic technology themes for 2027, which highlighted large quantitative models for heavily regulated fields such as healthcare, finance, and government, as well as AI context platforms and speech reasoning. For the third quarter of 2026, Gartner reported revenue of US$1,504.79 million and net income of US$214.42 million. The firm maintains full-year 2026 revenue guidance at or above US$6.405 billion, representing foreign exchange-neutral growth of 1%.