The Asia Pacific region is on track to overtake the United States as the largest colocation data centre market by both capacity and rental revenue before 2030, according to analysis from Cushman & Wakefield. “By 2030, the APAC region is likely to have around 23,904 MW of capacity, compared to around 18,256 MW in the U.S., according to the Asia Pacific Data Centre Investment Landscape report.
“Various forecast models show that Asia Pacific will overtake the United States as the largest colocation market in either 2028 or 2029. Based on the population differential, this is expected—but still significant given the depth and maturity of the US market,” said Pritesh Swamy, Head of Insights and Analysis for Cushman & Wakefield’s Asia Pacific Data Centre Group.
From a rental perspective, this equates to annual colocation rent of approximately US$44 billion across Asia Pacific in 2030, with 72% of that being generated across the five largest markets by capacity: Japan, Chinese Mainland, Australia, India and Malaysia.
Japan alone will account for 22% of the regional colo revenue—around US$9.6 billion in 2030—while the other four top markets are each expected to generate more than US$4 billion per year.
Swamy said Asia Pacific’s higher proportion of operational colocation capacity, combined with higher average colo rents on a per kW basis, helped to drive the region’s average rental rates above those in the US.
Colocation stock currently accounts for 58% of operational capacity in the US, compared to 85% in Asia Pacific. However, the development pipeline shows this gap will continue to narrow. By the end of the decade, colocation will account for 86% of operational capacity in APAC compared to 61% in the US; colocation capacity there will reach similar proportions to APAC in the years that follow as hyperscalers increasingly look to colocation providers to help meet the pace of cloud and AI demand.
