Xiaomi Trumps Apple to Become Third Largest Smartphone Maker in the World

The COVID-19 pandemic put immense pressure on the smartphone market. We saw a number offactories shutter temporarilyandsales falterdue to lockdown earlier in the year. Now, the smartphone market is witnessing a rebound but is still not at the same levels as last year. Gartner’snewest reportbacks up this claim, revealing that the sales declined 5.7% year-on-year. Phone makers shipped close to 366 million units globally in Q3 2020.

While Samsung emerges at the top with a 22% market share and replaces Huawei as it struggles to expand its 5G and smartphone portfolioamidst crackdownfrom the US. It leads to amassive 21% declinein Huawei’s global market share in comparison to Q3 2019. This might be an expected result, butXiaomi toppling Apple to emerge as the third biggest phone makerin the world will catch you by surprise.

As you can see in the screenshot below, Apple’s market share remains pretty much the same as last year. There’s only a minor deviation with the Cupertino company shipping 44.5 million units in Q3 2020. Xiaomi, however, managed toship over 44.4 million unitsduring the same time period.

The Chinese giant’s growth has been fueled by thebudget Note 9 seriesandaffordable 5G phonesacross the globe. Xiaomi also gained massively fromHuawei’s declinein its home country, securing a 12.1% market share globally.Image Courtesy: Gartner

Talking about the reason for the decline in sales, the Gartner report says,“Economic uncertainties and continued fear of the next wave of the pandemic continue to put pressure on nonessential spending through the end of 2020. The delay in 5G network upgrades has also limited the opportunity for smartphone vendors.”

Gartner’s latest report is in line withrecent IDC and Counterpoint reportsas well. All reports suggest that Samsung took the pole position worldwide, with Xiaomi rising to the occasion and meeting the pent-up demand after the lockdowns.“Consumers are limiting their discretionary spend even as some lockdown conditions have started to improve,”said Anshul Gupta, senior research director at Gartner.

Further, the report reveals that India was one of the leading markets that fueled the growth, with a 9.3% increase in sales, in Q3 2020. Other two of the five key leading markets, Indonesia and Brazil contributed 8.5% and 3.3% to the Q3 2020 shipments respectively

Anmol

Getting my start with technology journalism back in 2016, I have been working in the industry for over 7 years. Currently, as the Editor of Beebom, I’m leading the coverage on the website. While my expertise lies in Android, Windows, and the apps world, find me reading manga, watching anime, and playing Apex in my free time.

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