The latest ranking of global 5G mobile phones: Samsung is the clear winner, while Realme has the fastest growth rate

According to the latest research from Counterpoint Market Monitoring Services, the global smartphone market fell 4% year-on-year but grew 32% quarter-on-quarter to reach 366 million units in the third quarter of 2020. This recovery was driven by all major markets, such as the United States, India, and Latin America, which are gradually returning to normal as market lockdowns are eased. The smartphone market has shown resilience to the adverse effects of COVID-19 from both the supply and demand perspectives.

Commenting on the overall market dynamics, Tarun Pathak, Associate Director at Counterpoint said, “Eased lockdown conditions across all key markets paved way for exports and imports, thus streamlining the supply chain once again. Moreover, pent-up demand due to the lockdown also helped the smartphone market on the recovery track. As manufacturing units in China and Vietnam started functioning at normal levels while supply issues were resolved, in India, manufacturing units are operating at 80% of pre-COVID levels. Modest ‘back to school’ growth in markets like the US and Europe during the quarter helped the market recover.”

Samsung once again won the championship with 79.8 million units shipped, up 47% month-on-month and 2% year-on-year. This is Samsung's highest shipment in the past three years. Driven by new models such as Note 20 and the A series, the company successfully recovered in markets including India, Western Europe and Latin America. In the United States, the A series 5G SKUs showed strong penetration. In India, driven by the success of the M series, Samsung surpassed Xiaomi to become the number one player.

Huawei ranks second in the global market, but is on a downward trend, with its share falling from 20% in the second quarter of 2020 to 14% in the third quarter of 2020.

Xiaomi grew 75% from the previous quarter, grabbing 13% share for the quarter. Notably, this is also the first time Xiaomi has surpassed Apple to take third place. Research analyst Abhilash Kumar said: "Xiaomi achieved its highest ever shipments in the third quarter of 2020, reaching 46.2 million units. In China, Xiaomi shipments grew 28% year-on-year and 35% month-on-month. This was driven by a series of events and promotions during Xiaomi's 10th anniversary celebration in August. In addition, in new markets such as Latin America, Europe and multilateral agreements, Xiaomi's share has expanded rapidly due to Sino-US trade sanctions, but at the expense of Huawei. The brand also performed well in Southeast Asian markets such as Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam."

Note: Huawei includes Honor, Xiaomi includes Redmi

After Huawei splits off Honor, its share will further decline.

Talking about the 5G share, Research Analyst Aman Chaudhary said, “5G shipments continued to grow (up 82% QoQ). Interestingly, Q3 5G shipments exceeded the overall H1 2020 shipments. This growth was driven by the rapid rise of 5G devices in the sub-$300 price band from Huawei, vivo, OPPO, Xiaomi, and OnePlus. Affordable 5G devices will drive this segment in the coming quarters, especially in China. Also, with the launch of the iPhone 12 series in Q4, Apple will be key in driving 5G sales growth in markets such as the US, Canada, and Western Europe.”

 Counterpoint Research released a latest global 5G mobile phone research report this week, in which the Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra was the world's best-selling 5G model in September 2020.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra captured 5% of the market share among all 5G models, followed closely by the Huawei P40 Pro 5G, which was the best-selling 5G mobile phone model in August.

Top 10 5G mobile phones:

Samsung Note 20 Ultra

Huawei P40 Pro 5G

Huawei nova 7

Samsung Galaxy S20+

Huawei P40

vivo Y70s

OPPO Reno 4

Samsung Galaxy Note 20

Honor 30S

OPPO A72

The top five accounted for 21.6%, the top ten accounted for 36.7%, and a total of 7 models in the top 10 were from Chinese manufacturers. Counterpoint Research said that this is not surprising considering that more than 60% of the global 5G market is located in China.

In January 2020, the top 10 5G models were all flagship models, accounting for 93% of the total global 5G model sales. It is expected that with the arrival of 1,000-yuan 5G mobile phones, this figure will hit a new low.