Omdia: Global smartphone shipments reached 299 million units in Q2 2021, a year-on-year increase of 6.9%

According to the latest preliminary survey results released by Omdia , global smartphone shipments in the second quarter of 2021 were 299 million units, a year-on-year increase of 6.9% compared with 279.7 million units in the second quarter of last year .

Looking at the first half of 2021 , global smartphone shipments reached 651.8 million units, a year-on-year increase of 17.4% from 555.4 million units in the same period last year .

As the global smartphone competition landscape evolves, Xiaomi ranked second in the world for the first time in both the first and first half of this year. The company shipped 49.9 million units in the second quarter, second only to Samsung's 57.3 million units. In the first half of this year, Xiaomi's shipments reached 99.4 million units, second only to Samsung's 133.3 million units. Huawei's era as a key player influencing the smartphone market is over.

Source: Omdia

Samsung topped the list with shipments of 57.3 million units, up 5.6% year-on-year , compared with 54.3 million units shipped in the same period last year. The main reasons for the decline in shipments in the second quarter were the limited supply of key components and the spread of the mutant Covid-19 delta strain at Samsung's production bases in India and Vietnam, which led to reduced operations of production facilities.

Xiaomi ranked second in the second quarter of this year, with shipments of 49.9 million units, a year-on-year increase of 72.9% . Due to the spread of the Covid-19 delta variant in India in the second quarter , Xiaomi's smartphone production also declined. However, compared with Samsung, the decline in shipments was relatively small. This quarter did not see the expected month-on-month decline in Xiaomi's shipments, but instead increased slightly by less than one percentage point. The main reason for the increase in Xiaomi's shipments was the significant increase in sales in international markets outside Asia Pacific.

Apple ranked third globally with shipments increasing 7.5% year-on-year , thanks to a recovery in demand in developed markets and increased demand for high-end smartphones in emerging markets.

OPPO and vivo reversed their rankings again in the second quarter. OPPO shipped 32.5 million units, slightly higher than vivo 's 31.6 million units. Compared with last year, OPPO grew 44.7% year-on-year and vivo grew 33.5% year-on-year .

Realme 's shipments in the second quarter increased by 174.5% to 11.4 million units, up from 4.2 million units in the same period last year , once again maintaining the sixth place in the world, but the quarter-on-quarter was flat. Realme , along with Xiaomi and Honor, is one of the few smartphone brands to achieve year-on-year growth in the second quarter.

Huawei's shipments continued to decline, with shipments of 9.8 million units in the second quarter of this year, a year-on-year decrease of 74.6% and a month-on-month decrease of 33.3% .

Motorola's shipments increased 42.8% year-on-year, from 7.4 million units in the second quarter of last year to 10.6 million units this year . However, Motorola's shipments fell 33.3% from the previous quarter .

Transsion's smartphone brand Tecno saw shipments increase 35.7% year-on-year, from 5.3 million units in the second quarter of last year to 7.1 million units in this quarter .

Honor smartphone shipments ranked tenth, with 6.7 million units shipped this quarter, an increase of 86.1% from the first quarter . Honor officially calculated shipments independently from the first quarter of 2021. With the gradual recovery of supply chain resources and the orderly release of products, Honor's market share is gradually recovering.

Market performance in the first half of 2021

The shipment rankings in the second quarter also largely reflect the situation in the first half of the year.

First half of year shipment results (Mil. Units)

Source: Omdia

Samsung shipped 133 million units in the first half of the year, up from 113 million units in the first half of 2020 .

Thanks to its stable performance in the first two quarters of this year, Xiaomi has secured the second place in the world, with a total of 99.4 million units shipped in the first half of this year. Apple ranked third with 95.398 million units, a year-on-year increase of 24.9% .

In the first half of this year, Huawei still maintained the sixth place in the world with 24.5 million units shipped. However, due to well-known reasons, it still dropped sharply by 66.9% compared with the same period last year .

Motorola and Realme ranked seventh and eighth respectively with a slight gap, with shipments of 23.2 million and 22.8 million units respectively in the first half of this year.

Transsion continued its growth momentum in the first half of this year. Another sub-brand of Transsion, iTel , replaced LG and ranked tenth in the world. Transsion's two sub-brands, Tecno and iTel , ranked ninth and tenth in the global smartphone shipments in the first half of the year respectively. If calculated by Transsion's overall shipments, it should be the sixth largest smartphone company in the world.

Jusy Hong, Omdia Mobile Device Market Research Director, said: " Although global smartphone shipments were affected by the spread of the new coronavirus Delta variant and component shortages in the first half of the year, shipments still grew year-on-year in the second quarter. However, due to continued supply shortages and reduced demand, shipments are expected to turn negative in the third quarter compared with the previous year. "