Uptime Institute Global Data Center Survey 2025 (15th annual) — press release and public highlights

Overview

The survey ran in April-May 2025 and covered 800+ data centre owners and operators. This page uses the press release and widely reported figures; the executive summary report sits behind a form and was not read. The headline finding is a global average annual PUE of about 1.54, essentially unchanged since 2018-2019; the regional report cited has n=681. On rack density, averages are rising and the share of racks in the 10-30 kW band is growing, but few facilities exceed 30 kW.

Contrary to the impression created by AI headlines, most of the estate still runs at air-cooled densities. About 45% of IT workloads remain in corporate (on-premises) facilities, and about one-third of operators run some AI training or inference. On the operations side, nearly two-thirds of operators report difficulty retaining staff or hiring qualified candidates. One in ten impactful outages still causes serious or severe disruption. Reporting of sustainability metrics has also stalled.

The limits are plain: the source is a press release with no raw data or question wording, and respondents come from Uptime's customer and community base. The numbers suit a benchmark line for the industry average; they should not set the target for a single facility on their own. The gap is striking: an average of 1.54 means roughly 40% more total facility energy for the same IT load than the hyperscale-class reference of about 1.1.

Key points

1. Global average annual PUE about 1.54 (2025), essentially unchanged since about 2018-2019
2. Average rack densities rising; growing share in the 10-30 kW band; few facilities above 30 kW
3. About 45% of IT workloads still in corporate (on-premises) facilities
4. About one-third of operators run some AI training or inference
5. Nearly two-thirds of operators struggle to retain staff or hire qualified candidates
6. One in ten impactful outages still causes serious or severe disruption
7. Survey run April-May 2025 with 800+ respondents

Using it in design

• Use PUE 1.54 as the 'industry average' line on the efficiency dashboard, year-stamped and user-overridable
• Show hyperscale-class PUE of about 1.1 as the best-in-class reference
• Set enterprise rack-density presets to 5, 10, 20 and 30 kW
• Flag 'AI/HPC' presets above 30 kW as requiring a liquid-cooling review

Who should read it

Capacity and efficiency planners, enterprise IT managers and designers looking for an industry benchmark.

Related standards

• ISO/IEC 30134-2
• EN 50600-4-2
• The Green Grid PUE

Publication details

Authors

Uptime Institute

Publisher

Uptime Institute

Year

2025

Document language

English

Source type

Industry body

Access

Free to read

Licence

Copyright retained; citation only — the publisher’s terms apply to the original document

Citation