Apple was world's No. 1 smartphone vendor in Q4, report says

Led by demand for the hugely popular iPhone 11, Apple's share of the global smartphone market topped all competitors in the fourth quarter of 2019, according to statistics released on Wednesday.

The latest estimates from Strategy Analytics put Apple's iPhone shipments at 70.7 million units during the three-month period ending in December, enough to take an 18.9% share of the global market. That figure is up 7% from 65.9 million units in the year ago quarter, when Apple sat in the No. 2 spot behind Samsung.

Whole year iPhone shipments are pegged at 197.4 million units for 2019.

"This was Apple's best growth performance since 2015," said Neil Mawston, executive director at Strategy Analytics. "Apple's global smartphone marketshare has lifted from 18 percent to 19 percent in the past year. Apple is recovering, due to cheaper iPhone 11 pricing and healthier demand in Asia and North America."

Trailing close behind Apple was Samsung, which shipped 68.8 million smartphones for an 18.4% marketshare in the closing quarter of 2019. The Korean tech titan moved 69.3 million units for an 18.4% share of the market in 2018.

Huawei placed third for the quarter with 56 million shipments and a 15% marketshare, while Xiaomi came in fourth on 33 million units shipped for 8.8% of the market. Rounding out the top five was Oppo, which managed 30.5 million shipments and an 8.1% marketshare.

Overall, global smartphone shipments held steady in quarter four at 376 million units compared to 374.5 million units during the same period in 2018.

Apple's iPhone revenues returned to substantial growth in the important holiday quarter on the back of strong demand for the latest models released in September, especially the affordable iPhone 11. The performance, along with surging services and wearables segments, helped push the company to all-time record revenues of $91.8 billion, well above both Wall Street consensus and Apple's own guidance.

5 Comments

iOS_Guy80 5 Years · 905 comments

About 4 years ago

Wonder how many were upgrades vs. users switching from Android?

MacPro 18 Years · 19845 comments

Apple is obviously doomed now. What are they thinking? Volume and profits? What next?

gatorguy 13 Years · 24627 comments

iOS_Guy80 said:

Wonder how many were upgrades vs. users switching from Android?

Stats published here last year showed "switching platforms" was relatively rare anymore. Users by and large are committed to Android or iOS and not likely to change. In fact, IIRC Android users were even more likely to remain in the fold than iOS users tho the percentages were very close.

FWIW I have noted a number of folks on various blogs owning and using both Android and iOS devices depending on the need.

BTW for the entire year the same article says Huawei was number one in unit sales for the entire year, with Apple falling into third place from second behind Samsung.

StrangeDays 8 Years · 12986 comments

I've noticed our resident Apple critics have recently pivoted from "Chinese knockoffs are eating their lunch!" to "Apple's doing what I said to do!" lol. The cognitive dissonance is strong.

avon b7 20 Years · 8046 comments

StrangeDays said:

I've noticed our resident Apple critics have recently pivoted from "Chinese knockoffs are eating their lunch!" to "Apple's doing what I said to do!" lol. The cognitive dissonance is strong.

No.

Is that your conclusion after ONE quarter? Apple's historical blowout quarter, too! That's playing it safe I suppose!

This time last year Apple had issued a profit warning, had been bumped out of the top two spots on worldwide unit sales charts (for the first time in many years) was seriously lacking in terms of competitive hardware and found itself having to apply steep discounts to just to shift products. Announcing those discounts on its front page too. All that following years of flat sales.

Meanwhile, those 'Chinese knock-offs' managed to cut into new markets, collectively sweeping up a huge swathe of the world handset market. One of them managed massive growth without access to the world's second largest market and with the U.S government literally trying to destroy it. That same company simply switched away from U.S suppliers causing such short term and potential long term damage that the Pentagon and Department of Defense has reportedly stepped in - on national security grounds - to 'protect' U.S technology from further US plans to intensify actions against it.

Nevertheless, it has seen its business curtailed to the tune of billions of dollars as a result.

Those 'resident Apple critics' have largely been right and yes, Apple's moves have been very much in line with what critics have spoken on. You will just have to begrudgingly accept that.

In fact, people like yourself on the other hand, who regularly attack the critics, have been shown to be out of touch with how Apple is trying to make up for lost ground. You'll have to live with that.

As for cognitive dissonance, well, once again, no.