Top smartphone manufacturers in 2022: Apple wins year-end, Samsung remains market leader

The latest Canalys report on smartphone sales for 2022 reveals some interesting facts. First, the market doesn’t seem to be heading in a positive direction, with sales across the board down from the previous year. Next, Samsung and Apple seem to dominate the mobile device market, far behind the rest of the manufacturers, who don’t seem likely to catch up any time soon.

Apple dominated sales during the holiday season

Canalys has published data stating that the smartphone market for the fourth quarter of 2022, which is the October-December period, which historically sees the highest sales of the year due to the holiday season, saw a major decline from the same period in 2021. The difference is 17 percent and is the weakest quarter in a decade for the mobile phone market.

The drop in sales is also seen when all four quarters of the year just ended are taken into account. Canalys says it measured an 11% drop from 2021, with fewer than 1.2 billion devices shipped over the 12 months. Among the reasons for the drop can be listed inventory issues caused by China’s zero-COVID policy, which has delayed the manufacture of many parts and devices, and inflation leading to higher prices.

For Q4 2022, Apple came out on top, accounting for 25% of global mobile phone sales. Samsung was in second place with 20%, the two being followed by Xiaomi, Oppo and vivo, each with 11, 10, 8% of the market respectively.

Although Apple “won” the holiday season, Samsung still came out on top at the end of the year. The gap between Apple and Samsung is 3 percent, while Apple has a lead over Xiaomi of 6 percent, the next company in the ranking. The “top 5” companies in the smartphone market account for 72% of the market, with all other brands accounting for just 28%, just 6% more than Samsung.

Who were the biggest smartphone manufacturers in 2022

• Samsung – 22%
• Apple – 19%
• Xiaomi – 13%
• Oppo – 9%
• Alive – 9%
• Others – 28%

Preliminary estimates for 2023 say we can expect stagnation or insignificant increases.