In the world of smartphones, there has, for years now, been only two major players; Apple and Samsung. Constantly jostling for the larger piece of pie, it’s always interesting to see how many devices each of them have shipped around the world, and if this latest report is accurate, then during Q1 of 2016, Samsung outshipped Apple in terms of devices 2:1. The figures are part of a report from TrendForce, which we touched on earlier this week, and put Samsung ahead of Apple during Q1 of 2016, in both terms of market share and devices shipped. It’s important to remember that devices shipped isn’t the same as devices sold, but it’s a good metric to look at nonetheless.
According to TrendForce’s report for Q1 2016, Apple posted “largest quarterly decline ever for iPhone shipments” resulting in 42 Million iPhones shipped. Compared to Samsung’s 81 Million, this is roughly half as many shipments, giving Samsung the nod over Apple by almost twice as much. Where market share is concerned Samsung has cornered 27.80% of the market for themselves, which is almost twice as much as the 14.40% that Apple managed to score for the same period. This shows a gain for Samsung, up from the 22.10% of the market from Q4 2015, and a decline for Apple from the 20.90% of the market during the same Q4 2015 period.
Considering that Samsung launched the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 Edge towards the end of Q1 2016, we could see even bigger figures from Samsung as we head into Q2 2016. However, as Samsung’s latest and greatest didn’t have a new device from Apple to go up against, the iPhone SE is now on sale, and could take a little of Samsung’s market share away from them. The buying public is apparently responding well to the iPhone SE, but considering the Galaxy S7’s smaller 5.1-inch display, the two aren’t too far apart in terms of overall size. With a targeted campaign from Samsung to highight the age of the iPhone SE’s design and approach, Q2 2016 could be another good period for the South Korean firm. Of course, we’ll have to wait and see just how well Apple and Samsung do, but it’s interesting to see chinks in Apple’s armor start to show, that’s for sure.