Market intelligence firm IDC says the global smartphone market is taking a turn for the worse as rising prices, inflation, and a lack of innovation make consumers feel the need to upgrade their unit.
Apple lives in a parallel universe
Despite the current situation we find ourselves in, it seems that Apple will be one of the few companies that save from the trend that is taking the market, even increased the market share of the iPhone by the end of 2023. However, this should not be anything new, since, in the last fiscal quarter, Apple reported that there were currently more than 1,000 million in the world of active company devices.
Going back to the subject at hand, IDC determines that 2023 will have the lowest level of smartphone shipments in a decade and worst of all, the trend is expected to continue in 2024.
Experts indicate that this crisis situation is due to “The pandemic and a tough economy have added to the challenges facing the industry, but it has also been battling the simple fact that smartphone technology hit a plateau, and the average consumer could no longer see a reason to upgrade every year or two. The average person now upgrades their smartphone every three to four years.”
The trend has not started to fall in 2023 automatically, but since 2017 We are finding signs of exhaustion, with the difference that 2023 is when the downward curve is beginning to pick up speed, since the number of devices sold in 2023 has decreased by 3.2%, reaching a total of 1,150 million units.
This downtrend has an easy explanation from a user point of view, a stagnant development and most consumers now cling to their phones for 3-4 years instead of 1-2. If the phone works fine for me, why change?
When we say that Apple is a different company, it is because it is a different company, since it has been able to reverse the annual drop in sales, achieving a completely different result: interannual growth of 1.1%.
This data is not only accessible by Apple, but the IDC hopes that [«iOS vean un crecimiento del 1,1 % en 2023 para alcanzar una cuota máxima de todos los tiempos del 19,9 %, ya que iOS sigue siendo más resistente a los desafíos macro que Android, que se prevé que disminuya un 6,0 % este año […]»] Do you now understand why Apple wants to launch the iPhone SE? It can be the definitive thrust for the mobile devices of many companies.
One of the reasons for this change is the possibility of financing or purchase systems such as Apple Pay Later that makes it much easier to buy the device. In addition, we have to emphasize the importance of its ecosystem that makes it much harder to get out once you’re in because it makes everything about you, but it also makes everything about Apple.