Global smartphone sales spike as Samsung, Apple lose ground

China’s smartphone makers are slowly eating into Samsung and Apple’s global market share, this according to a new report by Gartner.

Globally, smartphone sales increased by 5.4% year-on-year, with 373.2-million devices sold. Leading this charge was Huawei, Oppo and BBK (the company that owns the likes of Oppo, OnePlus and Vivo).

The three manufacturers claimed 21% of the global smartphone sales market in Q3 2016, compared to Samsung‘s 23.6% and Apple‘s 13%.

Samsung had its worst smartphone sales quarters ever, thanks in part to the Note 7

Notably though, most of these smartphone sales from Oppo and BBK were in China.

The fall of the old guard?

Samsung and Apple had less successful quarters.

Notable was Samsung’s terrible performance, thanks in part to the Galaxy Note 7 debacle.

“Samsung’s smartphone sales in the third quarter of 2016 as a whole declined 14.2 per cent year over year — their worst performance ever,” Gartner notes.

Apple also had a torrid quarter.

The company’s global smartphones sales accounted for just 11.5% — it’s lowest total since 2009.

“Apple’s sales fell by 8.5 per cent in the US and by 31 per cent in China, two of its biggest markets. The iPhone 7 struggled to stimulate replacement sales,” Gartner concludes.