Apple is pulling past Samsung again

For the first time in four years, Apple has regained the leading position in the smartphone market. The company sold a total of around 79.9 million iPhones worldwide from October to the end of the year, 15 percent more than in the same quarter of the previous year, according to the US market research company Gartner. Competitor Samsung from South Korea sold 62.1 million smartphones during the period. Overall, however, smartphone shipments fell by 5.4 percent in the fourth quarter. According to Gartner, Apple achieved a market share of 20.8 percent with sales in the fourth quarter - and therefore took the lead again for the first time since the fourth quarter of 2016. Samsung had a market share of 16.2 percent. The Chinese manufacturers Xiaomi and Oppo follow in third and fourth place. According to Gartner, Huawei is in fifth place. In 2020 as a whole, sales of smartphones worldwide fell by 12.5 percent to 1.3 trillion devices, as Gartner announced. Samsung remained number one in 2020 as a whole with a market share of 18.8 percent, followed by Apple with 14.8 percent. The analysts assume, however, that the industry will record growth in the current year.