Samsung is No. 1 in global smartphone shipments. Also, Apple is No. 1 in global smartphone shipments. Apparently, it depends who you ask. Data from IDC and Counterpoint; chart by Claude.

John Koetsier

Journalists always want to be first with the story. But sometimes, it pays to be last. Especially when you have conflicting sources. According to Counterpoint’s recent reading of global smartphone shipments, Apple is now tops in smartphone shipments with 5% year-over-year growth and 21% market share in Q1 2026. However, according to IDC’s recent data, Samsung is tops with 3.6% year-over-year growth and 21.7% market share.

Also, Samsung both grew 3.6% (IDC) and lost 6% (Counterpoint. At the same time, Apple grew 3.3% (IDC) while also growing 5% (Counterpoint). And just to top it all off, the overall smartphone market is both down 4.1% (IDC) and 6% (Counterpoint.

So, what’s happened here is that two of the world’s most closely watched technology research firms examined the same global market, over the same three-month period, with access to overlapping supply chain and sell-through data, and fundamentally disagreed on who’s No. 1, disagreed on how bad the market is and disagreed on Samsung’s performance.

It happens, of course.

The real world is complex. Data sources are diverse and — worse — divergent. The biggest problem, however, is probably something any data janitor (read, data scientist) would recognize: definitions. The biggest part of the gap likely comes from methodology: how much weight each firm gives to factory shipment records versus channel inventory checks versus sell-through data. And, critically, how they handle OEMs that, as Counterpoint noted, frontloaded shipments ahead of anticipated component price hikes. Count those shipments as Q1 or don’t, and your Samsung numbers change dramatically.

The good news, I guess, is that if there’s ever a good time to have a data disagreement, it’s when the world is going crazy over AI, driving memory prices through the roof, and global conflicts are exacerbating everything in the supply chain.

The other good news: both IDC and Counterpoint are pretty synced on the big picture: global smartphone shipments broke a 10-consecutive-quarter growth streak that had run since mid-2023.

That — thank you AI hype — turned to a decline.

“This decline in shipments is primarily driven by memory players prioritizing AI data centers over consumer electronics, leaving OEMs with compressed margins and forcing them to pass increased Bills of Material (BOM) costs directly to the consumer," says Counterpoint’s Shilpi Jain. "While supplies remained constrained, rising energy prices, higher logistics costs, and economic uncertainty driven by tension in the Middle East kept consumer sentiment for new devices low, driving demand for refurbished devices and further weighing on shipments."

Premium phone makers like Apple are less price-exposed, which is why Apple grew. It’s notable that Samsung has premium phones as well, likely adding to the mixed growth/loss reports.

It’s probably going to get worse, says IDC’s Anthony Scarsella:

“The 4% decline in the market is just a sample of what’s to come as the memory situation intensifies on all fronts … emerging markets that focus on sub-$200 devices will offer consumers very few options as the growing cost of memory components will represent a larger challenge than what the pandemic delivered over five years ago.”

In several emerging markets, prices have risen by as much as 40–50%, the IDC says. Clearly, in price-sensitive markets, that’s huge.

Counterpoint describes Apple as "the most insulated brand against the memory crisis due to its ultra-premium positioning and highly integrated supply chain," and notes the company posted a 23% surge in China smartphone sales in the first nine weeks of the year.

Chinese smartphone makers, however, are in tough. Both IDC and Counterpoint set Xiaomi’s drop at roughly 19% year-over-year, the steepest among the top five. Xiaomi faces acute pressure because its heavy exposure to price-sensitive entry-level segments makes it highly vulnerable to rising memory costs. IDC shows OPPO down nearly 10% and vivo down nearly 7%, while Counterpoint sees OPPO down just 4% and vivo down only 2%.

Both IDC and Counterpoint converge on a finding outside the top five: Honor, Nothing, and Google Pixel all grew strongly. Honor and Nothing grew at 25% year-over-year and Google at 14%, driven by overseas expansion, distinctive design and niche positioning and edge AI capabilities respectively.

Nothing’s 25% growth tells an interesting story: brand differentiation and a coherent product identity can carve out meaningful share even in a contracting market, as long as you’re not competing in the budget segment that memory pricing is vaporizing. Google’s Pixel gains are quieter but still meaningful: a 14% gain in a market that is down 4–6% represents is impressive.

Meanwhile, both Apple and Samsung can proudly report to their shareholders that they are number one.