Windows Phone Market Share Soars while iOS Smartphone Market Share Remains Constant

ABI Research announced of some numbers from its Mobile Handset Markets Research Service this week. The numbers show some significant growth as well as some non-movement. The report states that 438 million handsets and 244 million smartphones were shipped during the third quarter of 2013.

It is not surprising that Samsung has retained its lead in handset shipments. Samsung grew its share of smartphone shipments to 35 percent. On the other hand, Apple’s share of the market remained flat and consistent at 14 percent.

The figure that might come as a surprise is the fact that Windows Phone has seen growth for year-on-year of 165 percent. Nokia was the leader in this area as it accounted for just slightly less than the entire package. Nokia brought in 95 percent of the Windows Phone shipment volume.

Nokia recently released its own figures for third quarter earnings results for this year. There was major growth in the North American region for Nokia this year. We are looking at a 366 percent increase year-on-year for the company.

This will mark the third consecutive quarter that smartphone shipment penetration has reached record high numbers. The Q3 2013 numbers came in at 56 percent. These figures are supported by strong Android shipment growth from Huawei, Lenovo, Xiaomi, and Samsung.

The Android platform reached a new high of 80.6 percent shipment share in Q3. According to ABI senior analyst, Michael Morgan, "The race for the third ecosystem is clearly favoring Windows Phone with 4 percent market share, over BlackBerry's 1.5 percent, but there remains little opportunity for new market entrants to make a significant impact on Android's dominance.”

Although the fourth quarter is slated to show that Apple will ship about 53 million iPhones, there doesn’t seem to be too much movement. Senior practice director, Nick Spencer said, "Even with a record Q4 for the iPhone, Apple is only expected to achieve 18.7% market share which is down from the 22.6 percent Apple achieved in Q4 2012, due to Android's growing dominance and the importance of emerging markets."

While the percentage numbers between Android and Windows Phone have a wide chasm, the fact that Windows Phone has seen a 165 percent growth this year says something. A lot more phones are being sold in emerging markets. Most of these are lower end feature phones. This accounts for companies like Nokia showing major growth as it does for Samsung retaining its overall lead in handset shipments.