Apple and Samsung are the two largest smartphone manufacturing companies in the world, and Strategy Analytics, a US-based market research company, has just released some interesting info regarding both of those companies. According to the source, the price gap between Samsung’s and Apple’s smartphones has reached $465, which is a record-breaking price gap. Now, this might sound confusing at first, so let us explain.
Strategy Analytics says that the difference between average retail prices of Apple’s and Samsung’s 4G LTE smartphones in the US is $465, well, at least it was during the fourth quarter last year, as this report is based on the info provided in that quarter. The average selling price of Apple’s smartphones hit the $692 mark, while Samsung’s devices were at $227. Now, this is kind of extreme case, mainly because the Galaxy Note 7 failed completely and the company had to recall the device, and the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus were selling really well during that time period. Samsung basically didn’t have a horse in that race, as the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus also launched in that quarter, while the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 Edge were introduced in Q1 2016. Needless to say, the Galaxy S8 and the Galaxy S8 Plus are not a part of this picture, as those two flagships landed in March this year.
Now, in addition to every that was said thus far, Strategy Analytics also mentions that this is not a temporary thing, the gap between these two companies is widening it seems. This doesn’t exactly come as a surprise, Samsung releases quite a few low-end and mid-range smartphones which are considerably more affordable than everything Apple has in its lineup. Apple release the iPhone SE as kind of a budget offering with the exact same design as the iPhone 5 and iPhone 5s, and yet that phone is quite expensive, it can’t even be considered a budget phone, at least not for most people. It will be interesting to see what will the price gap be later this year when the Galaxy S8 sales kick in, though it’s quite certain that Apple will have a huge advantage in this regard, though the price gap will probably be narrower than it was in Q4 2016.