Report Finds Slump in Mid-Price Smartphone Model Shipments
The low-end segment of the worldwide smartphone market is expanding most quickly worldwide at the expense of mid-price smartphone shipments, according to the Omdia Smartphone Model Market Tracker.
The study found that shipments of devices priced under $150 grew from 90 million to 120 million units shipped between first quarters of 2023 and this year.
Mid-Price Smartphone Shipments
The research showed that many smartphone owners in the mid-price segment either downgraded to less expensive low-end phones or moved to high-end devices.
In a complementary trend, Omdia found that the replacement cycle in emerging markets is shorter than in developed markets due to poor performance and shorter security and OS support for cheaper phones, according to Aaron West, the senior analyst in Omdia’s Smartphone group.
The middle market, which Omdia defines as those smartphones priced between $151 and $600, has not recovered from a significant decline early last year. In the first quarter of this year, mid-end phones accounted for 107 million units shipped, a decrease of 2 million compared to the first quarter of last year.
The high-end segment—phones priced above $600—increased unit sales from 70 million to 73 million in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the year-ago quarter. Omdia cited the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and the IPhone 15 Pro Max as examples of the growth of the high-end segment.
Shipments of the former increased 30% compared to S23 Ultra shipments during the first quarter of 2023. Shipments of the latter were 11.5 million units in 1Q 2024.
The iPhone 15 Pro Max was the most popular phone sold in the quarter.
Omdia is part of Informa Tech, a technology research and advisory group.