In 2025, U.S. data centers consumed an estimated 312.6 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity, nearly 40% of the Energy Institute's worldwide estimate. Data centers are helping to end a decades-long period of stagnant U.S. electricity demand, with Northern Virginia showing particularly dramatic load growth.
Continued AI expansion could increasingly be constrained by generation, transmission capacity, transformers, and other physical energy infrastructure.
Global data-center electricity demand reached 787.8 TWh in 2025, up from 658.2 TWh in 2024, representing an extraordinary increase of nearly 20% in a single year. If the world’s data centers were treated as a country, their electricity consumption would place them among the world’s largest power markets.
The United States accounts for nearly 40% of global data-center electricity consumption, with China ranking second at 26.1%.
