Every major phone company is losing significant money right now — except Apple

It’s been a rough year for new phone sales, with more people choosing to hold on to their current phones. A new report now tells us just how bad it’s been for everybody, but Apple.

Findings from Counterpoint’s Market Monitor Service have revealed that global handset market revenue dropped by 3% year-over-year (YoY) in Q3 of 2022. Additionally, the overall handset market saw a dip of 12% YoY in handset shipments for the quarter. However, it could have been much worse.

According to the research, Apple prevented a steeper decline in the global handset market revenue, due in part to the company launching the iPhone 14 series during this time. Apple reportedly saw 10% YoY revenue growth and 7% average selling price (ASP) growth in Q3 2022.

As for Apple’s competitors, Samsung’s revenue declined by 4% YoY in Q3 2022, despite almost doubling the shipments of its premium Flip and Fold series. Oppo saw an ASP decline of 5% YoY and a revenue decline of 27% YoY. But Xiaomi managed to profit a little, seeing revenue growth of 4% YoY thanks to its low to mid-tier phones.

The report also mentioned that 5G handsets managed to raise ASP by 10% YoY, but this is also thanks to Apple. In response to these findings, Senior Analyst Harmeet Singh Walia said:

At over $80 billion, the revenue contribution of 5G handsets reached an all-time high of 80% of global handset revenues, up from 69% in the third quarter of last year. In the same period, LTE handsets’ revenue contribution fell 10% to $19 billion. This shift from 4G to 5G has been led by Apple, which alone makes up for over half of all 5G revenues as over 95% of its phones are 5G-enabled.

These results could be the effect of the down economy. As inflation skyrocketed, consumers who would have normally purchased new phones chose not to. But the biggest takeaway from this report is that it seems nothing will stop people from picking up a new iPhone.