According to IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Tracker, Apple has surpassed Samsung for the first time to ship the largest number of smartphones in one year. IDC warns that the data it provides is preliminary and may change. However, Canalys also predicts Apple to be at the top of its game for 2023. IDC puts Apple’s mobile shipments total at 234.6 millions, while Samsung has 226.6 million. Xiaomi, Oppo and Transsion complete the top five, with 145.9 million, 103.1 million and 94.9 millions smartphones shipped respectively.
first time in global smartphone shipments :
IDC reports that Samsung was last not at the top of the annual board in 2010, 13 years ago. Apple was not even in the top five back then. Instead, Nokia was in the first place. Samsung came in second. LG Electronics in the third. ZTE in the fourth. And Research in Motion, which manufactures BlackBerry devices, in fifth. This list is proof that the smartphone industry has been around for a very long time.
Nabila Popal, research director of IDC’s Worldwide Tracker Team, said that Apple is not only the only company in the top 3 to have positive growth each year but it also takes the number one spot for the first ever time. Apple’s continued success and resilience are in part due to an increasing trend towards premium devices that now account for over 20% of the overall market. This is fueled by aggressive exchange offers and interest-free finance plans.
IDC reports that Apple was a major factor in Samsung’s fall from the top, but the company was also faced with intense competition by other Android manufacturers, including Huawei, OnePlus and Honor. Canalys says that Huawei’s growing strength could be a threat to Apple’s Chinese growth. In , reports surfaced last year that Huawei was able to bypass US sanctions in order to integrate a 7nm processor made by Chinese chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. into its Mate 60 Pro phone capable of 5G speed.
There are signs the market is recovering. Overall smartphone shipments fell 3.2 percent between 2022 and 2023. IDC reported that shipments increased 8.5 percent on an annual basis in the fourth quarter. Canalys reports it increasing 8 percent following seven consecutive quarters of declines.