Experts say smartphone sales will grow 50% in the first quarter of 2021. Many of us hope that the economic debacle caused by the pandemic will be followed by a great recovery in the form of a rebound.
The smartphone market and the technology market, in general, have not been among the worst off during the pandemic, and many users have had to acquire electronic equipment for teleworking. Obviously, this is not to say that they have not had difficulties too.
According to a research, the first quarter of the year will end with positive growth in phone shipments of 50% year-on-year, reaching 340 million units shipped.
Smartphone sales will grow 50% in the first quarter of 2021
In this first quarter of the year, the top smartphone seller worldwide will be Apple, reaching 60 million units, a decrease of one third compared to the 90 million it had sold in the previous quarter. Taking into account that last quarter of 2020 and the first quarter of this year, Apple is expected to maintain first place with a total of 150 million units sold. The second-largest seller will be Samsung, which will sell about 65 million units in this first quarter, which together with the 60 million of the previous quarter will leave them behind Apple with 125 million units.
Xiaomi benefits a lot from Huawei’s decline
Xiaomi is being the main beneficiary of Huawei‘s drop in sales as a result of the US veto. Xiaomi will rank third among manufacturers making the most shipments, with a total of 90 million units sold in the last two quarters.
This means that the company’s sales increased by 80% compared to the same period of the previous year, a spectacular growth. On the other side, Huawei falls to sixth place among global manufacturers with 20 million shipments in this first quarter, a residual figure if we compare it with the results of recent years.
Of course, this upturn in sales has a lot to do with 5G, a real stimulus for many users when considering getting a new smartphone. Smartphones with 5G connectivity will number more than 600 million by 2021.
In 2020, 280 million smartphones with 5G sold in total. 70% of these mobile sales have belonged to Huawei, Apple, and Samsung. The total number of smartphones estimated to be sold during 2021 will reach 1.4 billion units.
