Apple presented a phenomenal balance sheet for the first quarter of 2020/21, with records in all areas. The IDC analysts have calculated what it means in terms of iPhones sold, since Apple no longer reveals this information.
Based on their calculations Apple sold 90.1 million iPhones in the fourth calendar quarter of 2020 (Apple’s first fiscal quarter of 2021). According to IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker this equates to a 23.4% share of the global market and is an increase of 22.2 percent compared to the previous year.
Smartphone manufacturers shipped a total of 385.9 million devices during the quarter. Apple regained first place, pushing Samsung into second position with 73.9 million devices shipped and 19.1% of the market in the Christmas quarter. Xiaomi was in third position with 43.3 million devices shipped and 11.2% market share.
One reason for the strong growth in the final quarter of 2020, compared to the same quarter in 2019, is the slight delay in releasing the iPhone 12 family, which Apple was only able to bring to the market from the end of October 2020. Normally some of the sales would have been accounted for in the previous quarter.
The highest number of sales of iPhones in a quarter was in Q1 2017 when 78.3 million units were sold. At that time the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus were new and the first iPhone SE was still relatively fresh. In the following year, Apple reported more than 77 million units sold (iPhone X, 8 and 8 Plus) in the Christmas quarter.
Since 2019 Apple has not revealed details of unit sales for its products.
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This article originally appeared on Macwelt. Translation by Karen Haslam.
