Summary:
The world is printing a bit less, but not by much. Mobile device printing and
emerging markets are forecast to hold the market at about 3 trillion printed
pages a year.
The world is printing less, but the paperless society remains largely a myth
as page volume from printers was 2.98 trillion 2012, down 1.5 percent from 3.03
trillion in 2011, according to IDC data.IDC's stats provide a nice reality check on the status of printing. Sure, you can cover New York City 237 times with the volume of pages printed, but digital workflows are making a dent. IDC is projecting that global page volume will remain flat for 2013 to 2017.
Printer vendors maintain that the explosion of digital content means more printing. However, developed markets are printing less and page volume is being held flat by growth in emerging markets. Incremental page volume is also starting to come from mobile devices.
