Apple sold 78.3 million iPhones to beat Samsung in Q4 2016.
While in the last quarter of 2016 Samsung was negatively impacted by the Note 7 battery problems, resulting in a decreased year-over-year smartphone sales, Apple’s iPhone managed to increase its popularity and reach new heights.
In the quarter ending December 2016, Apple sold 77.5 million phones, a 3.5 million increase compared with Q4 2015. According to Strategy Analytics, Apple sold more phones than Samsung in the quarter – beating the Korean giant by 0.8 million units. However, for the whole 2016, Apple sold 215.4 million iPhones, which is not even close to Samsung’s 309 million. The 215 million iPhone sales in 2016 resulted in a market share of 14.5%, down from 16.1% in 2015.
Both Samsung and Apple have lost market shares in 2016, due to the expansion of the Chinese companies like Huawei, Oppo and Vivo. For example, Huawei managed to increase its market share from 7.4% to 9.3% in 2016, while OPPO ballooned from 2.8% to 5.7%.
Apple is expecting a good growth of the iPhone sales this year, bolstered by the upcoming major redesign of the smartphone for its 10th anniversary. The company also hopes to reverse the downtrend in the tablet market by introducing new models in 2017.