Apple & Samsung take 70% of holiday activations

During this holiday season Apple & Samsung accounted for 70% of devices activated according to Flurry Analytics, with Apple taking the Lion’s share with 44%. Google was a no show.

Flurry took a look at the most gifted smartphones and tablets around the globe this holiday season, examining activations throughout the week leading up to Christmas day. Flurry Analytics, part of Oath, is used by over 1M mobile apps and has insight into 2.1 billion devices worldwide.

Apple Dominate

Similar to last year, 44% of new phone and tablet activations were Apple devices. Whilst Samsung’s activation rate is up 5% from 2016 they fell short of Apple at 26%. Of note, Vivo who didn’t appear in last years numbers, had a significant adoption, which was attributed to their growth in China and India.

Notably absent is Google, Flurry reason that due to a limited number of phone models (4) and lack of consumer mind-share, the Pixel is failing to garner users interest.

Due to their affordability the iPhone 7 and iPhone 6 beat out Apple’s latest releases the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and the iPhone X, although the iPhone X was a close third.

When combined ,however, Apple’s latest releases - the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and the iPhone X - made up almost a third of all new activations at 31.5%.

The prominence of the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 7 however proves that cost is still a priority for consumers. The iPhone 6 was relaunched this year in select international markets as a more affordable option.

The year of the Phablet

Continuing the trend, Phablets (5in - 6.9in) have overtaken medium phones (3.5in - 4.9in) to take 53% of the market share.

With consumers not replacing their tablets as often total tablet activations dropped to 12% down from 17% in 2016.

Source