Manufacturers and machine shops booked more than $3.4 billion in new orders for metal cutting and forming machines during the first half of 2026, setting a new record for demand during any comparable period this century.

Machine shops’ and other US manufacturers’ demand for new capital equipment rose to $672.7 million in June 2026, 15.6% higher than May’s result and 56.8% above June 2025. “In the first half of 2026, manufacturing technology orders totalled $3.44 billion, a 36.0% increase over the first half of 2025,” according to AMT – the Association for Manufacturing Technology, which compiled the data for its monthly US Manufacturing Technology Orders Report.

AMT observed that the new-order volume during January to June 2026 “was the strongest half-year for the value of metalworking machinery orders since USMTO began collecting data in 1998.”

However, the 11 243 machines ordered during this period were -2.6% fewer than the number recorded during the second half of 2025, a trend that AMT has in the past attributed to the increasing value of automation technologies acquired by manufacturers together with the new machining/cutting/forming capabilities.

Aerospace machining operations led all buyers during January-June 2026, in terms of both order values and machine units. The value of their orders during January-June 2026 was nearly 33.0% higher than during July-December 2025, and the number of machines ordered was nearly 25.0% higher.

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