U.S. smartphone shipments grew 8% YoY in Q4 2023, driven by Apple as iPhone sell-in share grew to 64% in Q4 2023, the highest since Q4 2020, according to Counterpoint Research’s Market Monitor data. Android sell-in declined over the same period, as the sub-$300 segment saw declining demand.
“Q4 is usually very robust for Apple given the strong demand for iPhones during the holiday sales,” said Jeff Fieldhack, Counterpoint’s Research Director for North America, in a statement. “Throughout 2023, Apple made inroads in prepaid with its N-2 or N-3 devices, selling the iPhone 12 or iPhone 11 at very reduced prices, which also helped it grow its market share in this segment.”
On Android shipments, Senior Analyst Maurice Klaehne said, “While Q4 saw a slowdown in premium sales, it was the sub-$300 segment that saw the largest declines. Prepaid-to-postpaid migration continues to be robust and cable players like Comcast’s Xfinity Mobile and Charter Communications’ Spectrum Mobile are getting strong net-adds. Prepaid upgrade eligibilities have gone from 90 days to as high as 365 days. All these factors contribute to lower demand for prepaid smartphones.”
Commenting on carrier earnings and outlook, Associate Director Hanish Bhatia said, “Carriers continued to report weak upgrade rates, citing longer holding periods. However, postpaid gross adds for the Big Three were up 5% YoY, which helped premium device sales somewhat. Carrier revenues were largely driven by increasing service revenues due to consumers moving to higher-tier plans and increasing prices of legacy plans. The trend of bundling multiple products and services to help sales is rising and we will see more of it in 2024.”
MacDailyNews Take: The ignorati seem to finally be waking up to the painfully obvious fact that if it’s not an iPhone, it’s not an iPhone.
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