The global smartphone market has begun to show signs of recovery. According to the quarterly global mobile phone market research by IDC and research company Canalys, the smartphone market grew by 8.5% year-on-year. In particular, Apple won the award as the world’s leading smartphone vendor, breaking Samsung’s 13-year winning streak. The data reveals a lot of key information. Read on to find out everything below.
Global smartphone shipments show signs of recovery
Global smartphone shipments decreased by 3.2% year-on-year. However, on the other hand, sales reached 326 million units in Q4 2023, up from 300 million units in Q4 2022. This came after seven consecutive quarters of decline.
For the first time in the entire year, and also in Q4, Apple dominated the entire smartphone market. In the fourth quarter, it shipped 80.5 million devices, while for the whole of 2023, the company shipped 234 million devices. Apple took 20.1 percent of the market in 2023. Samsung took the second place with almost 226 million shipments and a market share of 19.4 percent. The South Korean brand shipped 53 million devices in Q4 2023. In terms of total shipments last year, Xiaomi ranked third with a market share of 12.5 percent, while OPPO and Transition took fourth and fifth place with market shares of 8.8 percent and 8.1 percent, respectively.
In the fourth quarter, Transition ranked fourth with 28.2 million sales and a market share of 8.6%, and recorded a 68% year-on-year growth. Vivo took fifth place with 24.1 million units sold and a market share of 7.4%. Samsung’s shipments in Q4 were down 10 percent year-on-year.
Compared to the same period last year, only Apple and Transition showed positive dynamics – 3.7 and 30.8 percent, respectively.
