Apple enjoyed 64.3 percent growth in the tablet market in Q1, expanding its leadership from 30.0 percent to 31.7 percent, according to IDC. Second placed Samsung inched up slightly to 20.0 percent share on 60.8 percent growth. Lenovo was third with 9.8 percent share and 138.1 percent growth.
But, the biggest growth came from Amazon, which came in fourth by growing 143 percent to hit 3.5 million units.
Hit by US sanctions, Huawei was the biggest loser, sliding from third to fifth with 27 million units shipped, a 1.7 percent growth.
The overall tablet market recorded a remarkable 55.2 percent year-over-year growth in Q1. Chromebook shipments were even more bullish, totalling 13 million units in Q1, up from 2.8 million from the corresponding quarter in 2020.
HP is the Q1 leader in the Chromebook market, followed by Lenovo, Acer, Dell, and Samsung.
Schools around the world had shown a strong preference for the tablet form factor due to its low cost and easy manageability. However, the rising popularity of Chromebooks is quickly leaving little room for tablets in markets such as the United States, Western Europe and Japan.
“There’s no doubt that Chromebooks have supplanted tablets in many education markets. However, price and the dependence on cloud services have prevented them from becoming mainstays in all regions. Besides, Chromebooks have yet to break into the consumer market in a meaningful way as competing notebooks as well as tablets, such as the iPad, Galaxy devices, and Fire tablets, maintain a strong presence,” said Jitesh Ubrani, Research Manager of IDC’s Mobility and Consumer Device Trackers.
Photo: Apple
Entelechy Asia 