Global electricity demand from data centers climbed from roughly 410 terawatt-hours in 2020 to nearly 790 terawatt-hours in 2025, according to a Statista chart based on the Energy Institute's Statistical Review of World Energy 2026. The near doubling in five years reflects the buildout of AI training and inference infrastructure alongside continued growth in cloud computing and traditional hosting.

The United States remains the largest single contributor, with its data centers drawing more than 300 terawatt-hours in 2025, up from roughly 170 terawatt-hours in 2020. China posted the fastest rate of growth among major markets, with its data center power draw rising past 200 terawatt-hours in 2025 after starting the period near 100 terawatt-hours.

Europe's data center electricity use also expanded steadily over the period, moving from under 100 terawatt-hours in 2020 to more than 150 terawatt-hours in 2025. Smaller but fast-growing categories, including the Middle East and Africa and South and Central America, each roughly doubled their data center power draw across the same five years, though they remain a small share of the global total.

The trend lines illustrate why utilities across the United States and abroad have moved to secure new generation capacity, from gas turbines to nuclear power purchase agreements, to keep pace with data center-driven load growth heading into the back half of the decade.

Source: Statista (Energy Institute, Statistical Review of World Energy 2026) - https://www.statista.com/chart/36384/global-data-center-electricity-demand/