Australia's smartphone market dips 6%, Apple & Google dominate

The International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker has reported a decline of 6.0% year-on-year in Australia's smartphone market during the fourth quarter of 2023, with 2.1 million units shipped. However, there was a quarter-on-quarter increase of 14.2% due to increased sales during the holiday season, which was mostly driven by the release of new models from Apple and Google, together with the Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales.

The decline in the smartphone market, however, contrasts with an increase in the average selling price (ASP), which rose by 7.1% year-on-year in the last quarter of 2023 to reach USD $853. This resulted in a modest 0.7% overall market growth in terms of value. Furthermore, shipments in the premium segment, with devices costing over USD $1000, reached 45%, up from 39% in the same quarter in 2022. This can be attributed to higher shipments of new flagship phones from Apple and Google.

Even with the overall decline in the market, smartphone sales through telcos remained relatively steady, while open channel sales experienced a significant reduction, suggesting buyers are leaning more towards purchasing phones within carrier contracts. Apple continued to dominate the market with the iPhone 15 series accounting for a significant proportion of its shipments. However, older models also remained popular within the consumer base.

The IDC report notes some shifts within the competitive market dynamics. Samsung's market share dropped slightly year-on-year due to the launch of the Galaxy S23 FE in the mid-range segment and Galaxy A05s in the low-end segment after a hiatus. Google, however, ascended to the third spot with their Pixel 8 series, tying with OPPO. Another noticeable shift was seen with Lenovo (Motorola) as it doubled its market share year-on-year to 3% with its mid-range G series models, tying with HMD (Nokia) for fourth place.

Kiranjeet Kaur, Associate Research Director for Devices Research at IDC Asia/Pacific, expressed an expectation for the Australian smartphone market to remain flat in 2024, despite planned promotions in January for the back-to-school season and end-of-financial-year events in June. Kaur predicts that economic pressures on household budgets will continue to cause weak demand in the first half of the year.