Smartphone sales are holding steady across the world and are set to continue their growth - with particularly good news for Apple.
According to research from TrendForce, the year-on-year increase in sales was 6% in the last quarter. The uptake is set to continue, said the research firm, predicting a boost in sales of 6.3% in the final quarter of the year.
Chinese brands did particularly well, posting a year-on-year increase of 20%. The top spots were held by Samsung, Apple, Huawei, Oppo and Vivo, while fast-rising Xiaomi held the sixth-spot – TrendForce expects the Chinese vendor to grow by an impressive 10% in the next quarter.
iPhone X sales
When it comes to the top manufacturers’ performances, there’s a bit of a mixed bag. Next quarter, Samsung’s year-on-year results are set to fall thanks to competition from the just-released iPhone X. Samsung suffered some setbacks in the third quarter, particularly in China, but nevertheless it did manage to ship 75 million to 80 million units on average every quarter.
Apple sales were helped by the launch of the iPhone 8 and iPhone Plus. The delays to the launch of the iPhone X would have hindered Apple sales in the last quarter but the new smartphone should definitely provide a boost for sales in the final quarter. And it’s quite a boost, TrendForce estimates that the iPhone production volume for this fourth quarter will reach 81 million units with iPhone X accounting for 33% of that.
And those iPhone sales are going to keep the smartphone market buoyant. In terms of total global production, TrendForce estimates a growth of 10.5% from the third quarter’s total - all thanks to the iPhone.
