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Warsaw is already Central and Eastern Europe’s most important data-center market, and its capacity is set to expand sharply. The city has connectivity, land and a growing customer base, while major investments are adding hyperscale, wholesale and AI capability. The deciding issue is electricity: projects will proceed only where grid capacity, prices and low-carbon supply are sufficiently certain.
Warsaw’s data-center market already has meaningful scale
Cushman & Wakefield counted 176 MW of operational data-center capacity in Warsaw in the first half of 2024, with another 81 MW under construction or planned. The market comprised 17 operators and 28 facilities, and colocation vacancy was 9%. That combination—substantial live capacity, a visible development pipeline and limited vacant space—puts Warsaw beyond the stage of being an untested emerging location.
National figures vary because providers measure different parts of the market. A 2025 Polish Investment and Trade Agency (PAIH) and DC Byte estimate put Polish supply at about 195 MW and take-up at about 152 MW in 2024. Separately, DC Byte reported total Polish market capacity rising from 184 MW in 2020 to 481 MW in 2024, with most of that growth in Warsaw. The figures should not be added together: they use different definitions and coverage, but they agree that Poland has expanded rapidly and that Warsaw is the principal growth engine.
How large could Warsaw become?
The European Data Centre Association’s 2026 forecast projects Warsaw colocation IT power supply to grow from 106 MW in 2024 to 329 MW in 2031, a 17.5% compound annual growth rate over the period.
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| Year | Forecast colocation IT power supply |
|---|---|
| 2024 | 106 MW |
| 2025 | 132 MW |
| 2026 | 188 MW |
| 2027 | 233 MW |
| 2028 | 233 MW |
| 2029 | 280 MW |
| 2030 | 301 MW |
| 2031 | 329 MW |
This is a forecast of colocation IT power supply, not a guarantee that every announced building will be energized on schedule. Actual delivery will depend on grid connections, construction, customer commitments and the availability of suitable electricity.
Why companies are choosing Warsaw
A bridge between Western and Central-Eastern Europe
Warsaw sits between established Western European markets and the faster-growing economies of Central and Eastern Europe. Its network position supports low-latency links to regional enterprise customers while giving operators access to international connectivity. That makes the city useful for cloud on-ramps, content delivery, financial services, software platforms and disaster-recovery deployments that need to serve several countries from one location.
More room than the most crowded European hubs
Cushman & Wakefield identifies lower land and power costs than in many FLAP-D markets—Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris and Dublin—as part of Warsaw’s appeal. The advantage is not simply a cheaper site. More available land can permit larger campuses, phased construction and setbacks for substations, cooling equipment and future expansion. In saturated hubs, a customer may have to accept a smaller facility, a longer wait for power or a premium for an existing building.
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Poland’s demand is being pushed by digitalisation, cloud adoption and AI integration, according to Kristina Lesnjak, senior consultant at DC Byte. That demand includes enterprise colocation as well as wholesale and hyperscale deployments. A market with several customer types is less dependent on a single project category, although very large AI and cloud campuses can still dominate the next wave of capacity additions.
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Investment announcements show that the pipeline is real—but still conditional
Microsoft’s Warsaw-area commitment
Microsoft announced nearly PLN 3 billion for a Warsaw-area data-center and AI investment in 2025. The company said the investment was planned for completion in 2026 and would primarily enhance Poland’s cybersecurity capabilities. The announcement signals confidence in local cloud demand and in Poland’s strategic role, but an announced investment should not be treated as the same thing as energized, customer-ready IT load.
Switch Datacenters’ WAW1 campus
Switch Datacenters announced that its WAW1 project has 90 MW of licensed power, a 60 MW first-phase IT load and a design that can exceed 100 MW after expansion. The company describes the facility as wholesale colocation with connectivity and services for cloud adoption, AI, big-data analytics and other compute-intensive workloads. Licensed power and design capacity indicate the project’s scale; they do not by themselves establish the date on which all phases will be operational.
Is Poland suitable for AI data centers?
Poland can support AI deployments when a site combines firm power, high-density cooling, resilient connectivity and a construction schedule that matches the customer’s training or inference workload. Warsaw has an emerging ecosystem rather than a single dominant AI campus.
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Atman advertises infrastructure supporting up to 80 kW per rack and liquid-cooling capability for high-density workloads. The figure is an operator-published maximum, accessed in 2026, not an independent market-wide benchmark. Buyers should confirm the supported accelerator platforms, cooling method, redundancy design, usable rack envelope and whether the quoted density applies to a whole room or only a defined deployment zone.
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What an AI customer must verify
- Power delivery: contracted IT load, utility connection milestones, backup generation and the difference between facility power and power available to the racks.
- Cooling: direct-to-chip or other liquid-cooling support, heat-rejection capacity, water strategy and maintenance procedures.
- Connectivity: diverse carrier routes, cross-connect availability and latency to the cloud regions and enterprise locations the workload serves.
- Deployment speed: ready capacity versus shell-and-core space that still requires electrical and mechanical fit-out.
- Carbon requirements: the contractual source and accounting treatment of renewable electricity, rather than an unqualified “green” claim.
Power is the binding constraint
PAIH states that energy availability is the dominant factor shaping data-center location decisions. For Warsaw, that means a strong demand story is not enough. A project needs a firm grid connection, predictable electricity pricing and a credible route to low-carbon supply. Delays in transmission or distribution upgrades can move an otherwise viable campus behind competing sites.
Power pressure also changes the economics of concentration. As more projects cluster around Warsaw, land near substations becomes scarcer and connection queues can lengthen. The result may be a two-speed market: Warsaw continues to attract customers that need its connectivity and enterprise proximity, while the next very large campuses are built elsewhere in Poland.
Warsaw versus other location choices
There is no single “best” Polish site. A customer should compare the complete operating case rather than headline megawatts.
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| Decision factor | Warsaw | Other Polish regions | Established FLAP-D hubs |
|---|---|---|---|
| Available IT power | Largest Polish cluster; 176 MW operational in H1 2024 and substantial forecast growth | Potentially more room for new campuses, but capacity is site-specific and not stated uniformly | Large existing ecosystems, often with tighter expansion constraints |
| Grid certainty | Demand and concentration increase pressure on local connections | Can offer alternatives where transmission capacity is available; must be verified for each site | Connection constraints are common in mature hubs |
| Land and construction economics | Lower than many FLAP-D markets according to Cushman & Wakefield, but prime sites are becoming scarcer | More land may be available, with economics depending on roads, substations and permitting | Often higher land and power costs |
| Connectivity and latency | Strongest Polish concentration of carriers, cloud demand and enterprise users | Requires confirmation of diverse fiber routes and latency to target customers | Deep connectivity and established interconnection ecosystems |
| AI density and cooling | Operator capabilities include advertised support up to 80 kW per rack and liquid cooling | Capability varies by facility; verify directly | Broad specialist supply, but premium capacity can be scarce |
| Customer mix | Enterprise, retail and wholesale colocation, cloud and hyperscale demand | More likely to be anchored by large wholesale or hyperscale projects | Highly diversified, mature customer bases |
| Permitting and delivery | Experienced market, but congestion can affect schedules | May provide development headroom; local permitting and infrastructure determine speed | Established processes, with limited expansion space in some locations |
Which Polish regions could capture the next wave?
PAIH identifies regional alternatives including Western Pomerania, Wielkopolskie and Pomorskie as areas that may capture incremental growth as Warsaw faces resource pressure. These regions are not automatic substitutes. A viable project still needs a confirmed grid connection, long-haul fiber, suitable land, water and cooling arrangements, construction contractors and enough nearby demand to justify the network design.
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For workloads that do not require Warsaw’s lowest possible latency, a regional campus can provide more room for phased expansion and reduce dependence on the capital’s constrained power nodes. Operators can also use a distributed architecture: latency-sensitive services remain close to Warsaw users, while training, backup, batch analytics or other less time-critical workloads run at a regional site.
What Poland must do to win a larger global share
- Make grid capacity bankable. Publish realistic connection dates, queue status and available headroom so developers can distinguish firm capacity from preliminary discussions.
- Improve price predictability. Long-lived data-center projects need a clearer view of power costs and the risks associated with market volatility.
- Expand low-carbon supply. Renewable generation, contracts and transmission must grow alongside data-center demand rather than being treated as a later add-on.
- Develop several hubs. Warsaw should remain the anchor, but Western Pomerania, Wielkopolskie and Pomorskie can relieve land and grid pressure if connectivity and permitting keep pace.
- Match infrastructure to AI requirements. High-density racks, liquid cooling, resilient power and specialist operations must be specified at procurement stage, not retrofitted after a building is leased.
- Measure delivered capacity clearly. Market reports and operator announcements should separate licensed power, planned capacity, construction capacity, energized facility load and customer take-up.
Outlook for 2026 and beyond
Warsaw has a credible case for a larger share of global data-center investment: it is already the leading Polish hub, its colocation supply is forecast to triple from 2024 to 2031, and major commitments demonstrate interest from cloud, AI and wholesale operators. The market’s limiting factor is not a lack of demand or geographic relevance. It is the ability to deliver dependable, affordable and lower-carbon electricity at the speed customers require.
If grid and energy planning keep pace, Warsaw can deepen its role as the bridge between Western Europe and Central-Eastern Europe while regional Polish sites absorb the most power-intensive expansion. If they do not, announced megawatts will remain a pipeline rather than operating capacity, and customers will divert projects to locations with firmer connections.
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