# Liquid Cooling Market Size and Forecast for AI Data Centers

Market data for data center liquid cooling: $8.3B in 2027, $22.56B by 2032 (22.1% CAGR). Segments by technology, coolant, data center type, workload, and geography.

Updated 2026-11-01. Also on the [web page](https://liquidcooling.fyi/guides/liquid-cooling-market-size).

The data center liquid cooling market is entering a rapid growth phase driven by AI rack densities exceeding air-cooling limits. This guide summarizes market size, segmentation, and key trends from Mordor Intelligence's 2026 report.

## Market size overview

| Metric | Value | Source |
|--------|-------|--------|
| Market size (2026, estimated) | $6.77 billion | Mordor Intelligence, 2026 |
| Market size (2027, forecast) | $8.3 billion | Mordor Intelligence, 2026 |
| Market size (2032, forecast) | $22.56 billion | Mordor Intelligence, 2026 |
| CAGR (2027-2032) | 22.14% | Mordor Intelligence, 2026 |

*Note: Mordor Intelligence's 2026 base combines nine months of actuals with Q4 projections. Other research firms publish different base figures, so treat the absolute size as firm-specific; the growth direction is consistent across them.*

## Segmentation by cooling technology (2026)

| Technology | Market share | Growth outlook |
|------------|--------------|----------------|
| Direct-to-chip liquid cooling | 42.79% | Steady growth; largest installed base |
| Immersion cooling | Not published | Fastest growing: 26.12% CAGR (2027-2032) |
| Rear-door heat exchangers (RDHx) | Not published | Strong retrofit demand |

*Mordor publishes a 2026 share for direct-to-chip only; it does not publish shares for the other technologies in its public summary. Direct-to-chip covers cold-plate designs, so no separate "cold-plate" segment exists.*

**Key points**:
- Direct-to-chip leads due to OEM warranty programs and NVIDIA/AMD reference designs (Mordor Intelligence, 2026)
- Immersion acceleration driven by two-phase fluorocarbon fluid supply chain maturation (Chemours/Navin Fluorine Opteon manufacturing capacity from 2026)
- RDHx favored for brownfield upgrades without server downtime

## Segmentation by coolant type (2026)

| Coolant type | Market share | Growth outlook |
|--------------|--------------|----------------|
| Single-phase hydrocarbon fluids | 45.08% | Largest segment |
| Two-phase fluorocarbon fluids | Not published | Fastest growing: 25.14% CAGR (2027-2032) |
| Water / glycol solutions | Not published | Facility-loop standard |
| Nanofluids / specialty | Not published | Niche, early stage |

**Key points**:
- The first Intel Data Center Certified immersion solution (2025) used a Shell hydrocarbon fluid with Supermicro servers and a Submer tank (Intel, 2025)
- Chemours and Navin Fluorine agreed in May 2025 to manufacture Opteon two-phase immersion fluid, with capacity from 2026 (Chemours, 2025)
- Microsoft uses a closed liquid loop in its Fairwater AI data centers (Mordor Intelligence, 2026)

## Segmentation by data center type (2026)

| Data center type | Market share | Growth outlook |
|------------------|--------------|----------------|
| Hyperscale | 39.17% | Largest; Google reports 2,000+ liquid-cooled TPU pods over seven years (Google, 2025) |
| Colocation | Not published | Growing; Equinix KL2 and Teraco JB4 built liquid-ready |
| Enterprise / on-premise | Not published | Slower adoption; brownfield constraints |
| Edge and micro DCs | Not published | Fastest growing: 24.48% CAGR (2027-2032) |

**Key points**:
- Hyperscale operators (Microsoft, Google, Oracle, Meta) drive volume through multi-year deployment programs
- Edge growth driven by distributed AI inference (Mordor Intelligence, 2026)
- Colocation "hall-ready" model (Equinix, Teraco) decouples facility readiness from tenant deployment

## Segmentation by workload (2026)

| Workload | Market share | Growth outlook |
|----------|--------------|----------------|
| AI / Machine Learning | 35.79% | Fastest growing: 25.48% CAGR (2027-2032) |
| HPC | Not published | Steady; traditional liquid cooling base |
| Cloud / Virtualization | Not published | Growing with AI cloud services (DGX Cloud, OCI) |
| Cryptocurrency mining | Not published | Immersion matured early in mining |
| Other | Not published | — |

**Key points**:
- Oracle deployed its first liquid-cooled GB200 NVL72 racks on OCI Supercluster in 2025 (NVIDIA/Oracle, 2025)
- NVIDIA DGX Cloud and OCI software integrations make cooling part of the rented service stack (Mordor Intelligence, 2026)

## Geographic breakdown (2026)

| Region | Market share | CAGR (2027-2032) | Key developments |
|--------|--------------|------------------|------------------|
| North America | 36.97% | Not published | Microsoft Fairwater WI closed-loop liquid cooling; US hyperscale dominance |
| APAC | Not published | **27.17%** (fastest) | Malaysia (Equinix KL2, AirTrunk JHB2), Japan, China, India |
| Europe | Not published | Not published | Germany (Energy Efficiency Act), Switzerland (NorthC/Legrand RDHx), Portugal (SINES) |
| South America | Not published | Not published | Brazil (ODATA/Aligned DeltaFlow at SP04) |
| Middle East & Africa | Not published | Not published | South Africa (Teraco JB4 liquid-ready halls), UAE, Saudi Arabia |

## Major players (2026)

| Company | Segment focus | Notable moves |
|---------|--------------|---------------|
| Vertiv Group | CDU, facility thermal | Named among CDU manufacturers benefiting from NVIDIA-aligned AI demand (Mordor Intelligence, 2026) |
| Schneider Electric | CDU, facility | Launched the Motivair WCDU, up to 3.5 MW per unit, September 2026 (Schneider Electric, 2026) |
| CoolIT Systems (Ecolab) | Direct-to-chip, CDU, services | Ecolab closed its ~$4.75B acquisition July 2026; CoolIT says its cold plates cool more than 5 million chips (Ecolab; CoolIT, 2026) |
| LiquidStack (Trane Technologies) | Immersion, CDU | Trane completed the acquisition March 2026; LiquidStack announced a 300 MW CDU order in January 2025 (Trane; LiquidStack) |
| Alfa Laval | Heat exchangers | Facility-loop system packages |
| Asperitas | Immersion | Shell Ventures investor; Shell fluid partner |
| Chilldyne (Daikin Applied) | Negative-pressure direct-to-chip | Acquired by Daikin Applied November 2025 (Daikin, 2025) |
| Legrand (USystems) | RDHx | ColdLogik RDHx at NorthC Münchenstein, November 2025 (Legrand/NorthC, 2025) |
| Rittal | RDHx, CDU | Independent vendor (Friedhelm Loh Group); not part of Legrand |
| Submer, Iceotope, Green Revolution Cooling | Immersion | Single/two-phase immersion specialists |
| Chemours, Shell, Syensqo | Fluids | Fluid qualification and supply chain |

## Key drivers (2026-2032)

Mordor Intelligence names these growth drivers for the forecast window (Mordor Intelligence, 2026):

- Surging rack densities (>30 kW) in AI and HPC racks
- Hyperscale net-zero roadmaps
- OEM warranties that cover direct-to-chip cooling
- NVIDIA and AMD liquid-ready reference designs
- Government green data-center incentives
- Waste-heat reuse for district heating

## Key restraints

Mordor Intelligence names these restraints (Mordor Intelligence, 2026):

- Limited field expertise among facility engineers
- High upfront retrofit costs for brownfield sites
- Fluid material-compatibility concerns
- Supply risk of specialty dielectric fluids

## Market outlook summary

- **2027-2029**: Direct-to-chip dominates new AI builds; immersion scales with two-phase fluid supply; RDHx leads retrofit.
- **2029-2032**: Two-phase immersion grows as fluid supply stabilizes; edge deployments accelerate; standardization reduces integration friction.
- **Regulatory**: EU minimum performance standards (proposal Q2 2027), Brazil REDATA tax regime water-efficiency conditions (MP 1.318/2025), Germany Energy Efficiency Act tightening.
- **Standardization**: OCP, ASHRAE TC 9.9, and IEA 4E identify lack of standardization as a key barrier (Mordor Intelligence, 2026).

## Sources

Checked 2026-11-01.

- Mordor Intelligence. "Data Center Liquid Cooling Market Report." 2026. https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/data-center-liquid-cooling-market
- Ecolab. "Ecolab Closes CoolIT Acquisition." 2 July 2026. https://www.ecolab.com/en-us/media-center/news/ecolab-closes-coolit-acquisition-and-expands-ai-cooling-platform
- Trane Technologies. "Trane Technologies Completes Acquisition of LiquidStack." 3 March 2026. https://investors.tranetechnologies.com/news-and-events/news-releases/news-release-details/2026/Trane-Technologies-Completes-Acquisition-of-LiquidStack/default.aspx
- LiquidStack. "LiquidStack Secures 300-Megawatt CDU Order." 6 January 2025. https://liquidstack.com/news/liquidstack-secures-300-megawatt-cdu-order-from-major-u-s-data-center-operator
- Schneider Electric. "Schneider Electric launches new Motivair coolant distribution unit (WCDU)." 23 September 2026. https://www.se.com/ww/en/about-us/newsroom/news/press-releases/schneider-electric-launches-new-motivair-coolant-distribution-unit-integrating-liquid-and-air-cooling-for-more-flexible-data-center-deployments-6ab39628a845186897090d0c/
- Daikin. "Daikin Applied Expands Data Center Offering with Acquisition of Chilldyne." 4 November 2025. https://www.daikinapplied.com/news/news/daikin-applied-expands-data-center-offering-with-acquisition-of-chilldyne
- Legrand / NorthC. "NorthC and Legrand deliver a new class of AI-enabled data center infrastructure in Münchenstein." November 2025. https://www.legrand.com/datacenter/int-en/reference-projects/northc-legrand-the-partnership-that-makes-ai-possible
- Google Cloud. "Enabling 1 MW IT racks and liquid cooling at OCP EMEA Summit." 2025. https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/systems/enabling-1-mw-it-racks-and-liquid-cooling-at-ocp-emea-summit
- Intel. "Intel and Shell Advance Immersion Cooling in Xeon-Based Data Centers." 2025. https://newsroom.intel.com/data-center/intel-shell-advance-immersion-cooling-xeon-based-data-centers
- Chemours. "Chemours and Navin Fluorine Announce Agreement to Manufacture New Liquid Cooling Product." 6 May 2025. https://www.chemours.com/en/news-media-center/all-news/press-releases/2025/chemours-and-navin-fluorine-announce-agreement-to-manufacture-new-liquid-cooling-product
- Equinix. "Equinix to Develop Purpose-Built IBX Data Center in Kuala Lumpur." May 2026. https://newsroom.equinix.com/2026-05-11-Equinix-to-Develop-Purpose-Built-IBX-Data-Center-in-Kuala-Lumpur-to-Support-Malaysias-AI-and-Cloud-Growth
- AirTrunk. "AirTrunk scales up in Malaysia with JHB2." https://airtrunk.com/airtrunk-scales-up-in-malaysia-with-announcement-of-second-malaysia-hyperscale-data-centre-jhb2/
- Teraco. "Teraco completes JB4 hyperscale data centre expansion." August 2025. https://www.teraco.co.za/news/teraco-completes-significant-jb4-hyperscale-data-centre-expansion-incorporating-new-sustainability-designs/
- ODATA / Aligned Data Centers. "ODATA brings DeltaFlow liquid cooling technology to Latin America." September 2026. https://aligneddc.com/press-release/odata-brings-next-generation-cooling-to-latin-america-with-deltaflow-liquid-cooling-technology/
- Oracle / NVIDIA. "Oracle and NVIDIA Help Enterprises Accelerate AI Innovation (GB200 NVL72 on OCI Supercluster)." June 2025. https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/oracle-cloud-infrastructure-blackwell-gpus-agentic-ai-reasoning-models/
- CoolIT Systems. "CoolIT Systems Celebrates 25 Years of Liquid Cooling Growth." 25 February 2026. https://www.coolitsystems.com/resources/news/coolit-25-years-liquid-cooling/
- TrendForce. "NVIDIA Blackwell's High Power Consumption Drives Cooling Demands." 30 July 2024. https://www.trendforce.com/presscenter/news/20240730-12232.html
- NVIDIA. "NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 Specifications." 2026. https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/data-center/gb200-nvl72/

## Questions

### What is the current market size for data center liquid cooling?

Mordor Intelligence estimates $6.77B in 2026, $8.3B in 2027, reaching $22.56B by 2032 at 22.14% CAGR (Mordor Intelligence, 2026).

### Which cooling technology has the largest market share?

Direct-to-chip liquid cooling held 42.79% share in 2026. Immersion cooling is forecast to grow fastest at 26.12% CAGR (2027-2032) (Mordor Intelligence, 2026).

### Which region is growing fastest?

APAC at 27.17% CAGR (2027-2032), driven by Malaysia (Equinix KL2, AirTrunk JHB2), Japan, and China. North America held 36.97% share in 2026 (Mordor Intelligence, 2026).

### What share does AI/ML workloads represent?

AI/ML was 35.79% of the market in 2026 and is the fastest-growing workload segment at 25.48% CAGR (Mordor Intelligence, 2026).