ConstructConnect's October 2026 Data Center Report puts US data center construction spending at $98.5 billion year to date through August. August alone totaled $14.4 billion across 17 projects, which lifted the year-to-date project count to 153.

Data centers accounted for 24 percent of all nonresidential building starts through August 2026. The largest project to break ground in August was the nearly 300-acre AVAIO Digital campus in Little Rock, Arkansas, valued at $6 billion.

Project size is rising. Among data centers with known prices and square footage, the average year-to-date project costs $1.18 billion and covers 707,000 square feet. The comparable 2025 figures were $507.4 million and 493,000 square feet.

The geography of new construction is shifting away from the coasts toward the Midwest and the South. Four of the five contiguous states between Wisconsin and Ohio have reported data center starts of $10 billion or more. The four states between Texas and Mississippi show similarly strong spending, with Texas above $22 billion. States along the eastern seaboard between Georgia and Virginia report between $5 billion and more than $20 billion.

The pipeline remains large. ConstructConnect Project Intelligence is tracking 65 data center projects worth $26.1 billion with start dates before the end of 2026. Texas leads with more than $11 billion in planned projects remaining this year, and South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia and West Virginia each have $2 billion or more. The Midwest holds just 1.5 percent of the near-term planned value.

Power infrastructure starts are 119.9 percent above the same period in 2025 and are forecast to rise 30 percent in 2027 compared with full-year 2026.

Source: ConstructConnect News - https://news.constructconnect.com/october-2026-data-center-report-spending-reaches-98.5-billion-ytd-construction-costs-rise