Gartner Forecasts IT Spending in Australia to Exceed $192 Billion in 2027

GOLD COAST, 16 September 2026 - IT spending in Australia is expected to exceed A$192.2 billion in 2027, an increase of 8.7% from 2026, according to Gartner, Inc. a business and technology insights company. 

"Technology investment in Australia is being reshaped by the growing recognition that AI will influence every aspect of how organisations operate and compete," said Neil Osmond, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner and Conference Chair of Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo, taking place on the Gold Coast until Wednesday. 

"Business leaders are moving beyond isolated use cases and investing in the infrastructure and software ecosystems required to embed AI across the enterprise. This is driving a long-term reallocation of technology spending toward capabilities that can deliver agility, productivity and innovation at scale."

Gartner forecasts spending on infrastructure as a service (IaaS) by Australian organisations will see the largest growth in 2027, increasing 22.1% to A$9.1 billion. This segment is being driven by rapid growth in AI-optimised IaaS, which is projected to grow 58.5% in 2027.

This is followed by data centre systems, which is forecast to grow 16.6% in Australia to reach A$14.6 billion in 2027. Within this category, server spending will increase 19.7%, reflecting continued investment in AI-optimised servers by service providers and hyperscalers to support GenAI adoption and the rapid operationalisation of AI across enterprise cloud applications and workflows (Table 1).

Table 1. Australian IT Spending Forecast 2026-2027 (Millions of AU Dollars)

"The rapid growth in AI-optimised servers and data centre systems spending in Australia is part of the global AI infrastructure roll-out, which is the largest infrastructure project ever attempted," said John-David Lovelock, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner. "This new capacity will support the AI model and agent workloads required by organisations as they scale AI capabilities across the enterprise."

Largest Spending Directed to Software

Software will remain the largest IT spending category in Australia in 2027. Gartner forecasts software spending in Australia will exceed A$68 billion in 2027, a 13.3% increase from 2026.

"Continued strong growth in enterprise software within Australia is largely fuelled by the addition of GenAI models and agentic AI to the existing cloud software running within organisations," said Lovelock. "Software featuring embedded agentic capabilities will see increasing demand by business leaders. Early value is already materialising across high-impact segments, specifically CRM and analytics."

Gartner's IT spending forecast methodology relies heavily on rigorous analysis of the sales by over a thousand vendors across the entire range of IT products and services. Gartner uses primary research techniques, complemented by secondary research sources, to build a comprehensive database of market size data on which to base its forecast.

Additional Insights Available 

The Gartner quarterly IT spending forecast delivers a unique perspective on IT spending across the hardware, software, IT services and telecommunications segments. These reports help Gartner clients understand market opportunities and challenges. The most recent IT spending forecast research is available to Gartner clients in Gartner Market Databook, 2Q26. 

More information on the forecast can be found in the upcoming complimentary Gartner webinar Q2 2026 IT Spending Forecast: An Ocean of AI Possibility, a Bucket of Capacity.

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