We’re all familiar with how smartphone sales go in North America. Apple has half of the market with Samsung hovering at just under 30% and the rest of the companies all at under 10%. Google sat at about 1% for a while, but that changed. Thanks to Pixel 6 sales, Google was able to break into the top five smartphone OEMs in North America.
The Pixel brand of phones has been a popular brand among tech enthusiasts, but most average phone consumers aren’t too familiar with these phones. Regardless, the brand was able to capture about 1% of the market and hold onto it over the years.
While that doesn’t seem like much, you have to take into account a few things. First, that’s more than the hundreds of other smartphone makers who are sitting at a fraction of a percent. Secondly, Google is going up against the juggernauts that are Apple and Samsung. 1% is definitely a feat.
However, Pixel 6 sales rocketed Google into the top five smartphone OEMs in North America
Now, thanks to the new numbers from Canalys, we now know that Google is no longer at 1%. The company nearly quadrupled its numbers from Q1 2021 and was able to capture 3% of the market in Q1 2022.
Again, a 2% jump doesn’t seem like much, but there are a few factors that make this a significant jump. The company experienced a 380% increase in sales compared to Q1 of 2021. So, it nearly quadrupled its market share. Back in Q1 2021, Google sold about 200,000 units. In Q1 of 2022, Google sold about 1.2 million units.
Another thing we have to consider is the competition. So far in 2022, some of the most popular phones on the market were the Samsung Galaxy S22 phones. These phones were some of the biggest phones to launch, and that definitely put a shadow on the Pixel phones (and all other phones).
How did the other companies do?
Well, Apple is at the top (big surprise!) of the charts with 51% (19.9 million units) of North American market for Q1 2022. That’s up from 45% (16.9 million units) in Q1 2021. In second place is Samsung with 27% (10.5 million units) and that’s just a 1% increase from last year’s 10.4 million units.
Next, we have Motorola who’s been selling a lot of budget phones. The company was able to pull in 10% of the market with 4 million units sold. That’s a sharp increase over last year’s 7% with 2.6 million units sold. Behind Motorola is TCL with 1.4 million units sold, which is a decline from 1.7 million units sold last year.
In fifth place, we have Google, and under it, we have the dreaded “Other” category at 2.1 million units sold in Q1 2022. With the excitement for the Pixel 6a and the Pixel 7, we can expect Google to see more gains in the market over the next year.