Apple still dominates tablet sales in contracting market

Posted:
in iPad
Apple's iPad accounted for two out of every five tablets sold in the holiday quarter worldwide, and is still picking up steam in a contracting market.




While Apple's holiday season earnings were lower than expected because of manufacturing issues in China, new research says that iPad sales actually increased year over year.

According to analyst firm TechInsights, the overall tablet market declined 8% in Q4 2022, which is "a slower pace than the last five quarters." For that holiday quarter, as opposed to the whole year, Apple took 39% of the market, while Samsung took 19%.

Apple and Samsung were the only firms to see any growth year over year, at 15% and 5% respectively. Amazon dropped 11%, while Lenovo sank 49% YoY.

"Apple had a favorable comparison from last year when supply chain troubles severely limited their shipments," said Eric Smith, direct of TechInsights' Connected Computing. "Apple also had some big product launches in the newest iPad Pro with the M2 chip and the 10th generation iPad, pushing global ASPs to $520."

"Samsung had another good quarter, focusing its attention on the flagship Galaxy Tab S8 series as the premium segment is showing less exposure to the downside of inflation as users look for computing devices to get work done remotely," continued Smith. "Samsung is actively pushing an ecosystem strategy for phones, tablets, PCs, and wearables through marketing and features that work across these devices to promote cross-ownership among its large user base."

For Q4 2022, TechInsights estimates that Apple shipped 18.1 million iPads. That's compared to 7.7 million Samsung tablets, 4.9 million Kindles, and 2.9 million Lenovo tablets.

Source: TechInsights
Source: TechInsights


Across the whole of 2022, Apple is believed to have sold 63.5 million iPads, compared to 30.2 million Samsung tablets.

In its latest financial earnings report, Apple announced that including iPad, iPhone, and all of its products, there are now over two billion devices in active use.

Read on AppleInsider

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 5
    They just reported iPad revenue above Mac revenue.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 2 of 5
    They just reported iPad revenue above Mac revenue.
    That isn't unusual. Prior to the switch to Apple Silicon, which caused a lot of people to upgrade faster than normal, Apple often sold less than 20 million Macs a year, and most of those were the entry level models - Core i3 MacBook Air, Core i3 Mac Mini, 13" MacBook Pro and all generally with minimum RAM and storage - meaning that Apple was usually making as much or more money on the 50 million iPads sold a year. The $329 iPad uses outdated/leftover components, giving it a decent margin. The iPad Air (which uses "newer but not the newest" components so margin is still good) costs $500 and the iPad Pro - which sells a ton - starts at $800, which is more than the Mac Mini and only $200 less than the MBA. By contrast, the Macs all have the latest components. Even the new $600 Mac Mini in the 14 year old box has the latest chip and SSD. The MacBooks have that plus redesigned exteriors, which include a keyboard, trackpad and larger screen. (Yes, the iPads have touchscreens. But they also get those in bulk from Samsung who charges "mobile component" prices for them, not PC component prices.) 

    While the tablet boom that was caused by the pandemic will end, sending iPad sales back to normal, once the newness factor of Apple Silicon dies down, Mac sales are also going to go from the near 30 million the past 2 years and revert to the mean of about 18 to 22 million a year.
    FileMakerFellermuthuk_vanalingamwatto_cobra
  • Reply 3 of 5
    entropysentropys Posts: 4,267member
    The Samsung tablets are definitely nice hardware. Very nice and incredible for the price. 
    However, I cannot fathom why anyone would buy an Android based tablet. We complain about ipadOS, but really, Android in a tablet is just… weak. And then there is the way apps work.

    maybe because I use an iPad for actual work purposes my view is a little distorted, and most of these tablet buyers are doing so to just watch Netflix. I also suspect this list includes e-readers.
    edited February 2023 Diletantewatto_cobra
  • Reply 4 of 5
    Glad that they are doing well with the iPad. My 12.9” M1 iPad Pro is a fabulous machine and I am doing a lot of work with it that would have previously been done with the Mac and enjoying it more. There is still much to do in iPadOS but Stage Manager is a hit for me and I hope to see feature parity across Mac and iPad SW offerings (from Apple at least) in the future.
    watto_cobradanox
  • Reply 5 of 5
    davgregdavgreg Posts: 1,046member
    thadec said:
    They just reported iPad revenue above Mac revenue.
    …and the iPad Pro - which sells a ton - starts at $800, which is more than the Mac Mini and only $200 less than the MBA.

    If you buy the iPad Pro 12.9 and get the very expensive keyboard cover and 2nd gen Apple Pen you are well into MacBook Pro price territory.
    With improved external  monitor support the reasons for buying a Mac get to be less and less each year.

    I have the M1 Pro 14” MBP and I think it will be my Mac for quite a few years. About the only things at this point that it does that cannot be done well with my iPAd Pro is the  MIDI Keyboard, Blu-Ray and DVD ripping and archival and the use of my Pluggable USB HD unit for a bunch of archival HDs that I have. It rarely sees mobile use. Just wish it had Face ID.

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