2025 Annual Benchmark (Historical)

2025 IT Budget Benchmarks

Global IT spending in 2025 was $5.55 trillion, up 9.3 percent year-on-year. The year established the AI infrastructure investment pattern that 2026 has continued at a slightly faster pace. Below are the segment actuals, regulatory milestones (DORA, EU AI Act, NIS2) and three lessons that shape 2026 planning.

Global IT Spending 2025 (Actual / Estimated)

$5.55T

Up 9.3 percent year-on-year from 2024 ($5.08T). Source: Gartner IT spending forecast updates through 2025-2026.

The Year That Established the AI Pattern

2025 was the year AI moved from boardroom theme to budget line item across most enterprises. Pre-2024, IT spending growth had run in the 4-6 percent baseline range for most of the post-pandemic period. 2024 stepped up to 5.4 percent. 2025 to 9.3 percent. 2026 forecast at 10.8 percent. The acceleration is structural, driven by AI infrastructure investment that does not look like it is slowing.

The AI investment wave is concentrated in three places. First, hyperscaler capex on AI-capable data centres (NVIDIA GPUs, supporting infrastructure). Second, AI-embedded SaaS adoption (Microsoft Copilot, Salesforce Einstein, GitHub Copilot) at scale, adding $20-$60 per user per month at full deployment. Third, custom AI and machine learning workloads at companies building AI into their products.

For typical enterprises (not hyperscalers or AI-native start-ups), 2025 was the year AI line items appeared in IT budgets. Most companies that had run small AI pilots in 2023-2024 found themselves with production AI deployments and recognisable cloud cost growth by mid-2025. FinOps discipline matured significantly through 2025 in response to AI workload cost surprises.

2025 Segment Actuals

Segment	2025 Spend	Growth vs 2024	What Happened
Data centre systems	$489B	+22.7%	AI GPU buildout. NVIDIA H100 / H200 GPU shortages drove premium pricing through 2025.
Devices	$764B	+13.4%	AI PC refresh wave begins. Microsoft Copilot+ PC launches mid-2024, sales build through 2025.
Software	$1.10T	+11.7%	AI-embedded SaaS, Microsoft Copilot enterprise rollouts at scale, Salesforce Einstein adoption.
IT services	$1.63T	+9.4%	AI implementation services, cloud migration, ongoing digital transformation.
Communications services	$1.54T	+5.0%	Stable mature segment.

2025 Regulatory and Market Milestones

Eight specific events through 2025 shaped IT budgets. The regulatory milestones (DORA, EU AI Act phases, NIS2 enforcement) added measurable spend at affected organisations. The market events (cyber insurance renewals, AI talent acceleration, cloud cost overruns) shifted year-on-year cost patterns.

DORA enforcement begins

Jan 2025

Digital Operational Resilience Act becomes enforceable across all EU financial services. Affected firms had spent 2 years preparing.

EU AI Act prohibited practices effective

Feb 2025

First operative phase of the AI Act. Bans on certain AI uses (real-time biometric identification in public spaces, social scoring, etc.).

Cyber insurance renewal cycle

Mar 2025

Major spring renewal cycle saw widespread premium increases of 15-30 percent for mid-market firms, with much stricter control requirements.

Microsoft Copilot enterprise scale-up

Apr 2025

Microsoft reported Copilot revenue inflection in earnings calls, indicating broad enterprise adoption beyond pilot phase.

AI talent wage acceleration

Jun 2025

Mid-year salary surveys (Robert Half, Hays) showed AI-skilled engineer premiums climbing past 25 percent above non-AI peers.

EU AI Act general-purpose AI obligations effective

Aug 2025

GPAI providers (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind, Meta) face transparency and governance obligations. Indirect impact on enterprise AI users via vendor disclosures.

Cloud cost overrun wave

Oct 2025

Q3 earnings season revealed widespread cloud cost overruns at companies that scaled AI workloads through 2025. FinOps adoption accelerated.

NIS2 enforcement actions

Dec 2025

Initial round of NIS2 enforcement actions in early-implementing member states (Germany, Netherlands, Nordics).

Three Lessons for 2026 Planning

Three patterns from 2025 that are worth carrying into 2026 budget planning:

AI pilots scale faster than expected, with cloud cost surprise.
Most CIOs underestimated how quickly AI pilots would become production deployments through 2025, and how much associated cloud cost would grow. The companies that handled the transition well had FinOps practices and AI cost governance in place before the rollouts. The companies that struggled either did emergency cost-cutting on production AI workloads or absorbed unbudgeted cloud cost growth. For 2026: build FinOps maturity ahead of AI scaling, not after.
Cyber insurance underwriting got materially harder.
Spring 2025 cyber insurance renewals brought premium increases of 15-30 percent for typical mid-market firms, with much stricter control requirements. Several mid-market firms found themselves temporarily uninsurable until they implemented MFA on all accounts, EDR on all endpoints, network segmentation, and incident response plans. For 2026: treat cyber insurance underwriting as a forcing function for security control implementation, not a transactional renewal.
AI talent costs ran ahead of budget plans.
By mid-2025, AI-skilled engineers commanded 25-40 percent premiums above non-AI peers per Robert Half, Hays and Levels.fyi data. Most 2025 budgets had assumed 5-10 percent salary inflation; AI-skilled hires came in 20-30 percent above plan. For 2026: build AI talent premium into the personnel line if you are hiring AI-skilled engineers, and consider whether hiring at premium or upskilling existing staff is the better play.

IT Budget 2026 (Current)

$6.15T projected, 10.8 percent growth, AI scaling.

Spending Forecast Hub

Multi-year forecast view and segment trends.

Cybersecurity Budget

The 2025 cyber insurance underwriting wave.

Cloud Spending

FinOps maturity after the 2025 AI cost wave.

European IT Budget

DORA, EU AI Act, NIS2 cost lines.

IT Staffing Costs

AI-skilled wage premium from 2025.

Use 2025 baseline to plan 2026

The calculator helps you set 2026 budget against your industry, size and region peer benchmarks.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How big was global IT spending in 2025?

Global IT spending in 2025 was $5.55 trillion per Gartner, up 9.3 percent year-on-year from 2024. This was already an above-baseline year (typical is 4-6 percent annual growth) driven by AI infrastructure buildout, cloud migration, and cybersecurity expansion. 2026's projected 10.8 percent growth continues the same pattern at a slightly faster pace, indicating the AI investment wave is not slowing yet.

What was the IT budget as percentage of revenue in 2025?

The cross-industry average was approximately 5.5 percent of revenue in 2025, up slightly from 5.3 percent in 2024. Industry ranges remained 2 percent (manufacturing) to 14 percent (pure-play e-commerce, SaaS). Per-employee spend averaged $11,000, up roughly 6 percent from the 2024 average of $10,400. The increase year-on-year was driven by AI tooling, security expansion and SaaS price inflation, the same forces continuing into 2026.

What were the top CIO priorities in 2025?

Per Gartner's 2025 CIO Agenda survey, the top priorities were: (1) AI infrastructure deployment, with most CIOs running multiple production AI pilots, (2) cybersecurity, with 38 percent increasing security spend above inflation, (3) cloud cost optimisation as cloud bills started growing faster than revenue at many companies, (4) ERP modernisation continuing as a multi-year programme, (5) talent strategy with skills gaps in AI and security as the dominant concerns. The 2026 priorities are very similar in shape, slightly more concentrated on AI scaling.

What regulatory milestones happened in 2025?

Three big ones. DORA (Digital Operational Resilience Act) became enforceable across the EU on 17 January 2025, affecting financial services. EU AI Act began phased entry into force from August 2024 with prohibited AI practices effective February 2025 and general-purpose AI obligations from August 2025. NIS2 transposition by EU member states completed during 2024-2025 with enforcement actions starting in late 2025. Each added measurable IT spend to affected organisations.

What lessons from 2025 IT budgets apply to 2026 planning?

Three lessons that the 2025 cycle made clear. First, AI pilots become production AI faster than most CIOs planned for, with associated unplanned cloud cost growth. FinOps disciplines need to be in place before AI rollouts, not after. Second, security underwriting got tougher: cyber insurance renewals in 2025 came with much stricter control requirements, and several mid-market firms found themselves uninsurable until they implemented MFA, EDR and segmentation programmes. Third, AI talent hiring underestimated significantly: AI-skilled engineers commanded 30-40 percent premiums by year-end, more than budgeted for at the start of the year.

How does 2025 compare to 2024?

2025 was a step-up year from 2024 (which was approximately 5.4 percent global growth). The acceleration came from AI infrastructure investment finally translating into recognisable revenue for hyperscalers and chip vendors, plus the AI-embedded SaaS wave (Microsoft Copilot at scale, Salesforce Einstein, GitHub Copilot enterprise rollouts). Pre-2024, IT spending growth had been in the 4-6 percent baseline range for most of the post-pandemic period. The 2024-2026 acceleration represents the structural AI investment wave.