A Row of Their Own: Data Centers in the Census Bureau's Table of Private Construction Spending

The U.S. Census Bureau measures what it calls the value of private construction put in place, month by month, and its table of that spending gives data centers a row of their own. The values are in millions of dollars, at a seasonally adjusted annual rate. The line under the table gives the source as "U.S. Census Bureau, Construction Spending, October 1, 2026." For a reader who lends to, owns or builds data centers, that row is the Bureau's own figure for data center construction put in place.

The data center row

The row sits under offices. In the table, "Data center" stands under "Office," beside "General" and "Financial." For August 2026, the latest month, it shows $84,950 million. That month is marked preliminary, and the two before it are marked revised. July 2026 stands at $79,007 million, and August 2025, a year earlier, at $49,052 million.

The table does its own arithmetic. In its columns for percent change, the data center row shows 7.5% for August 2026 from July 2026, and 73.2% for August 2026 from August 2025. Those are the Bureau's figures, not a sum made here.

Beside the other rows

The same table carries other rows of private construction for the same month. All of these are for August 2026, preliminary, at a seasonally adjusted annual rate. The percent changes are the table's own, from August 2025.

• Office, the row data centers stand under: $134,119 million.
• General, the first row under Office: $45,809 million, down 9.7%.
• Total Private Construction: $1,655,280 million, down 3.1%.
• Power (inc. Gas and Oil): $165,900 million, up 9.7%.
• Manufacturing: $168,209 million, down 19.8%.

Two rows that bear on this subject, data centers and power, which in the table includes gas and oil, both rose from a year before while the total fell. The table gives both and says nothing of how one bears on the other.

What the table does not say

The table warns in its own heading that "Details may not add to totals since all types of construction are not shown separately." Under its second table, which gives the Bureau's measures of error, a note says that "Coefficients of variation and standard errors are relevant to the estimate from the most recent period." For its method, the source line points to the Bureau's page on the survey methodology.

Nothing in the table says what counts as a data center. It does not say how much of the value is the building and how much is the equipment inside it, and it names no place.

A value of construction put in place is not a count of capacity coming online. A reader who takes the row as one is reading more into it than the table holds.