It was never going to be easy for Huawei smartphones outside China after their Google license was revoked by the US government. The situation has seen them relinquish their position to Xiaomi, now the third-best smartphone brand in the world.
According to market research agency strategy analytics, released for February 2020, a total of 62M smartphone units were shipped, compared to 2019, smartphone shipping has seen a decline of 39%.
Huawei had to give up its place as the third-best smartphone brand after shipping only 5.5m smartphones. Xiaomi shipment was slightly high, with the company able to ship 6M units. However, both still experience a big decline against Huawei 12.2m and Xiaomi’s 10m in January 2019.
From the percentage, it shows that Huawei nearly down 69% compared to what it shipped in January last year. For Xiaomi, they have seen their total shipment drop by 30%, which is more than twice that of Huawei.
Similarly, Samsung and Apple shipped the most phones as of February. Samsung shipped 18.2m phones, followed by Apple, with 10m iPhones. The former dropped 12% but managed to remain first, to Apple sitting in second with a 27% decrease.
Oppo and Vivo both ranked fifth and sixth with 7.6m units shipped among them. Oppo shipment declined by 49% while Vivo total shipment in February was 3.6m, which signifies a 54% decrease. Meanwhile, Lenovo-Motorola, LG, Transsion, and Realme are now in the top 10.
Also read: how to install Google play store on Chinese Android phone
Overall, smartphone shipment decreased last month because of the COVID-19 outbreak. It affected the Chinese market, which is the largest smartphone market in the globe. Meanwhile, the country is now recovering from the pandemic, while other markets are yet to see the full effect. But we think Xiaomi will remain the third-best smartphone brand for a while with the US not ready to revoke its ban yet.
