Introduction:

Gartner, a company that delivers actionable, objective insight to executive and their teams , recently released its 2026 Magic Quadrant™ for Desktop as a Service (DaaS) report. Alibaba Cloud has been positioned in the Leaders quadrant for the first time.

Gartner: DaaS market is moving beyond traditional virtual desktop delivery to incorporate AI, evolving into a highly intelligent platform

In the report, Gartner mentions that “DaaS market is moving beyond traditional virtual desktop delivery to incorporate AI, evolving into a highly intelligent platform driven by intense vendor investments in AI-native capabilities that introduce automation, self-healing environments and autonomous workspace operations.” Vendors in the Leaders quadrant, including Alibaba Cloud, we believe that clearly demonstrate AI-driven operational automation, intelligent cost optimization, and the underlying infrastructure to host emerging AI Agent workloads.

DaaS market is moving beyond traditional virtual desktop delivery to incorporate AI, evolving into a highly intelligent platform driven by intense vendor investments in AI-native capabilities that introduce automation, self-healing environments and autonomous workspace operations.

Alibaba Cloud’s Elastic Desktop Service has experienced rapid market growth over the past year. With an industry-leading Service Level Agreement (SLA) of up to 99.975%, Elastic Desktop Service has become the DaaS provider with the highest service availability, surpassing competitors and showcasing robust market competitiveness and development potential. Since being recognized the Magic Quadrant for the first time in 2023, Alibaba Cloud was recognized as a Niche Player in 2023 & 2024, a Challenger in 2025, and a Leader now in 2026.

Gartner mentions that by 2030, 20% of desktop as a service (DaaS) workspaces will be for AI agents, not people, to perform work, up from almost zero in 2026 and forecasts that DaaS spending will grow from $4.9 billion in 2026 to $6.5 billion in 2030.

Alibaba Cloud Elastic Desktop Service: A Premier Foundation for AI Agents

Since 2026, Elastic Desktop Service has been expanding its user base from humans to AI Agents, evolving DaaS from a single-use-case scenario into a multi-functional, multi-dimensional foundation for AI Agents.

For instance, to address compute-heavy scenarios, Elastic Desktop Service embeds high-performance GPU computing power directly into the cloud desktop. This allows users to launch a cloud-based AI workstation equipped with professional-grade graphics cards in minutes. Featuring up to 48GB of VRAM per card, the environment comes pre-configured with CUDA, PyTorch, and Conda right out of the box. Elastic Desktop Service intelligently schedules and elastically scales GPU computing and VRAM resources, freeing heavy workloads—such as model training and inference, 3D rendering, and simulation design—from the constraints of local graphics card specifications and queue wait times. Currently, leading companies in the embodied AI sector, including Digo Robotics, LimX Dynamics, and Lightwheel AI, rely on EDS AI Workstations to drive business innovation.

For AI Agent scenarios, EDS has introduced the Agentic Computer—a desktop-level environment purpose-built for Agents. It enables AI Agents to run continuously 24/7 with high performance and robust security within enterprise environments. EDS Agentic Computer provides full Windows and Linux desktops, allowing existing enterprise software to run directly without modification. It covers approximately 80% of real-world office scenarios, making it highly compatible with use cases like AI coding. On the security front, it integrates with six major enterprise identity providers (IdPs) and employs a 7-layer security loop to cover seven major risk categories during Agent runtime. With end-to-end observability and controllability—ranging from system snapshots and secure gateways to behavioral auditing—it provides a complete chain of custody for compliance, allowing Agents to securely access enterprise intranets.

Source: Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Desktop as a Service, By Stuart Downes, Todd Larivee, Sunil Kumar, 5 August 2026

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