Apple’s iPhone 7 and 7 Plus dominated first quarter smartphone shipments worldwide, but Oppo’s latest flagship device packed enough of a punch to propel it to the number three spot ahead of Samsung, a new report from Strategy Analytics reveals.
According to Strategy Analytics’ data, the small iPhone 7 was the crowd favorite in the first quarter, racking up 21.5 million units shipped in the three-month period. The device’s larger counterpart, the iPhone 7 Plus, was also wildly popular, spurring 17.4 million shipments in the same timeframe. But up-and-coming Chinese vendor Oppo pulled an upset to capture the number three spot from Samsung, the firm found. While Oppo’s R9s pulled in about half the number of shipments Apple’s iPhone 7 Plus did, the 8.9 million figure was still more than enough to unseat Samsung’s 2016 Galaxy J3. The J3 accounted for just 6.1 million units shipped.
“Oppo’s R9s shipped 8.9 million units for third place and 3 percent market share worldwide in Q1 2017,” Strategy Analytics Executive Director Neil Mawston observed. “Oppo is largely unknown in the Western world, but its brand is wildly popular in China and growing rapidly across India. The R9s is Oppo’s flagship 4G device with key features such as dual-SIM connectivity and fingerprint security.”
It should be noted here that Samsung’s launch of its new Galaxy S8 smartphone came at the end of the quarter, leaving Oppo without a new Samsung device to compete against in the first quarter thanks to the Note 7 recall debacle in the fall. But the Oppo device still put in a respectable performance for a relative unknown.
Strategy Analytics said the market share by device stood at 6.1 percent for the iPhone 7, 4.9 percent for the iPhone 7 Plus, 2.5 percent for the R9s, and 1.7 percent for the Galaxy J3.
In terms of first quarter smartphone shipments overall, however, Samsung was in the top seat with 80.2 million units shipped. Apple lagged in second with 50.8 million shipments. Huawei came in third place by shipment volume, but Oppo was hot on its heels with 27.6 million shipments.
