Samsung is no longer the world’s biggest smartphone maker
Samsung is no longer the world’s biggest smartphone maker
Apple shipped more smartphones than Samsung in 2023
Spoiler: Apple.
Samsung adopted so many Apple standards in an attempt to be like Apple (locked-in battery, headphone jack removal, SD card removal, obscene price increases for more internal storage) that eventually people started switching to Apple.
Imagine my shock
And their cameras got worse. The shutter lag on my S22+ was ridiculous. I missed so many good moments with my kids because it either failed to take the picture on time or the picture it did take was a blurry mess. After using Samsung for several generations, I traded for an iPhone 15 Pro. The camera alone was worth the switch. It turns out if you spend years copying Apple then people would rather just buy the real thing once you’ve removed all the features that made you unique.
TL;DR - A combination of more competition from China in Android smartphones, and an increase in Apple sales, caused Apple to overtake Samsung.
IDC's group vice president Ryan Reith believes Huawei's strong comeback in China and Honor, OnePlus, and Google launching "very competitive devices in the lower price range of the high end" segment played a key role in Samsung's shipment decline.
Samsung was not the only major Android manufacturer to register a decline in its yearly smartphone shipments. Xiaomi and Oppo occupied the third and fourth slots and saw their yearly shipments decline by 4.7% and 9.9%, respectively.
Makes sense. The Android ecosystem is pretty diverse these days. A lot of companies are making quality phones so it's spread out more.
I'm sure there'll only be people who read the headlines, so here's what's going on:
Overall shipments decreased by 40 million, but there were two companies who made gains within the top 5: Apple, who shipped 8 million units more, and Transsion, who shipped 22 million units more. Samsung dropped 40 million units, similar to the overall shipments. Looks like Transsion made the most of it during this dip, taking away marketshare from other Android phone makers.
world's largest vendor of smartphones; largest manufacturer would technically be foxconn, wouldn't it?
Nobody knows who actually makes the products, just what name is on it. Better to throw Samsung in the article for the clicks.