Saudi Arabia’s data center market is entering a decisive acceleration phase, rapidly becoming a foundational pillar of the Kingdom’s digital economy. Driven by Vision 2030, large scale AI ambitions, hyperscaler investment and abundant energy resources, the sector is evolving from a supporting infrastructure layer into a strategic national asset.
Between 2024 and 2030, the Kingdom’s data center IT load is projected to grow at a compound annual rate of approximately 29%, positioning Saudi Arabia as one of the fastest growing data center markets globally. As global cloud and AI leaders commit billions of dollars in capital expenditure and regulatory reforms continue to unlock foreign investment, data centers are emerging as a core enabler of economic diversification beyond hydrocarbons.
For investors, operators and policymakers, the opportunity is substantial but so are the execution, sustainability and governance challenges.
Vision 2030: Structuring a digital first economy
Saudi Arabia’s data center expansion is not market led alone; it is policy enabled by design. Vision 2030 places digital infrastructure at the centre of economic diversification, with explicit focus on ICT, AI, cloud computing, smart cities, healthcare, logistics and advanced manufacturing.
The Kingdom’s investment to GDP ratio is expected to remain structurally high over the next 5–10 years, driven by sustained public and private sector capital deployment. Data centers sit at the intersection of this agenda, supporting national priorities including:
- Sovereign cloud and data localisation
- AI model development, including Arabic large language models
- Smart city and digital government platforms
- Private sector productivity and digital enablement
Institutions such as the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA) and initiatives under the National Industrial Development and Logistics Program (NIDLP) have further reinforced demand for scalable, secure and high performance digital infrastructure.
Market scale and geographic concentration
As of Q1 2025, Saudi Arabia’s data center market had an estimated 222 MW of installed IT power capacity, with an additional ~760 MW planned by 2030. Growth is highly concentrated in three metropolitan hubs:
- Riyadh – the political, economic and regulatory centre, anchoring hyperscale, government and enterprise demand
- Dammam / Eastern Province – benefiting from proximity to energy assets and evolving into a digital industrial cluster
- Jeddah – leveraging port infrastructure and international connectivity for cloud and content delivery
Each city plays a distinct role in the national data center ecosystem, collectively enabling redundancy, latency optimisation and scalable expansion.
Competitive landscape: From colocation to hyperscale and AI
Competition within the Saudi data center market is intensifying, with a mix of telecom backed incumbents, real estate groups, sovereign linked platforms and hyperscale focused entrants.
Established operators provide a combination of retail and wholesale capacity, while newer platforms are targeting large format hyperscale and AI optimised facilities. Of particular strategic significance is Humain, a Public Investment Fund–backed entity coordinating national AI infrastructure ambitions.
Planned Humain facilities near Riyadh and Dammam could deliver up to 6.6 GW of capacity by 2034, a scale that would fundamentally reshape the regional data center landscape. The ambition to process approximately 6% of global AI workloads positions Saudi Arabia as a potential global AI infrastructure hub rather than a regional follower.
Hyperscalers and AI: Capital flows accelerate
Global cloud and AI providers are making long term commitments to Saudi Arabia:
- Multiple hyperscale cloud regions are scheduled to come online by 2026, serving enterprise and government workloads locally
- Major technology firms are partnering with Saudi entities to deploy AI optimised capacity, including GPU dense infrastructure
- NVIDIA has committed to supplying 18,000 next generation AI chips for an announced 500 MW of capacity as part of a broader multi billion dollar investment framework
These commitments reflect confidence not only in demand growth, but also in Saudi Arabia’s regulatory direction, energy availability and execution capacity at scale.
Energy advantage: A structural differentiator
Power availability is one of the most binding constraints in global AI data center development. Saudi Arabia, by contrast, enters this cycle with a structural advantage.
The Kingdom operates a national grid with installed generation capacity exceeding 400 TWh annually, well above current demand. While approximately 60% of power generation currently comes from gas and oil, renewable capacity is expanding rapidly, with Vision 2030 targeting 50% renewable electricity by 2030.
Unlike many mature markets facing permitting delays and grid congestion, Saudi Arabia can:
- Develop new generation capacity adjacent to data center clusters
- Maintain competitive electricity pricing through regulated tariffs
- Ensure reliability using gas fired baseload while scaling renewables
This combination materially reduces time to market risk for hyperscalers and AI operators.
Sustainability and water: The emerging constraint
While energy availability is a strength, water availability is emerging as a critical constraint. Data centers in Saudi Arabia reportedly consumed ~15 billion litres of water in 2024, primarily for cooling. As capacity scales, this demand will intensify in an already arid environment.
Future competitiveness will depend on:
- Adoption of water efficient and dry cooling technologies
- Integration of non potable or recycled water sources
- Alignment with desalination expansion and infrastructure planning
Sustainability is no longer a reputational consideration it is becoming a gating factor for regulatory approval and long term viability.
Regulatory and investment considerations
Saudi Arabia has taken decisive steps to attract foreign investment, including:
- 100% foreign ownership in designated sectors and zones
- Special Economic Zones offering tax and customs incentives
- Long term residency programmes for skilled professionals
Foreign direct investment has increased from ~$5.3 billion in 2020 to over $31 billion by 2024, with annual inflows expected to remain above $20 billion in the medium term.
However, large scale and strategic data center projects often require Public Investment Fund approval, introducing an additional governance layer that balances national priorities with fiscal discipline.
Strategic outlook
Saudi Arabia’s data center market is transitioning from capacity build out to strategic orchestration. The next phase will be defined by:
- Execution capability at hyperscale and AI density
- Regulatory clarity on data sovereignty and AI governance
- Sustainable resource management, particularly water
- Alignment between public ambition and private capital discipline
If managed effectively, data centers will act as a force multiplier for the Kingdom’s digital economy supporting cloud adoption, AI leadership, enterprise productivity and global competitiveness.
