kW per rack (rack density)

kW per rack, or rack density, is the amount of electrical power a data center delivers to a single cabinet, which in turn determines how much compute can be installed there. Traditional enterprise racks draw 3-8 kW; cloud racks commonly run 10-20 kW; and AI training racks have pushed far higher — NVIDIA's GB200 NVL72 draws around 120-130 kW per rack, with announced roadmaps (Rubin Ultra NVL576) targeting roughly 600 kW. Density dictates cooling technology: air handles up to roughly 20-40 kW with containment, rear-door heat exchangers extend to about 50-70 kW, and direct-to-chip liquid cooling is required beyond. Colocation pricing and design are increasingly quoted per kW rather than per rack precisely because density varies so widely between workloads.