Apple Dominates Samsung In Holiday Sales Battle

The numbers are in, and Apple officially outdid Samsung when it came to holiday sales this year.

The ongoing informal battle between the two companies for Christmas, Flurry Analytics confirmed, was won by Apple by two to one.

This means that for every Samsung device activated during the holiday season, Apple saw two.

“This year, 44 percent of new phone and tablet activations were Apple devices with Samsung seeing 21 percent. While Samsung is slowly growing in popularity throughout the holiday season, up 1 percent from last year, Apple devices continue to be the gift to give,” Chris Klotzbach, director at Flurry, and Lali Kesiraju, Flurry’s marketing and analytics manager, said in a blog post about the company’s findings.

Flurry’s data also revealed that phablet devices (ranging from 5 to 6.9 inches) are continuing to capture a significant portion of the market share compared to its small to medium-sized counterparts.

“Although medium phones saw the most activations during the week leading up to the holidays, Phablets continue to increase their holiday share, at the detriment of the medium phone,” the blog post continued. “Tablet device activations have stabilized and are relatively flat year over year. This indicates that users find purpose for their purchase, albeit the devices cater to more niche use.”

Earlier this month, Kantar World Panel’s data confirmed that the iPhone 7 was the top-selling device in the U.S. and the U.K., in the three months up to October.

Analysts noted that Samsung’s recall of its competitor device, the Galaxy Note 7, has been Apple’s and the iPhone’s gain.

“While Android dominates in terms of the raw number of devices it powers, Apple remains the most desirable smartphone brand in the world,” Lauren Guenveur, Kantar’s consumer insight director, noted. Android devices make up more than 75 percent of smartphone sales in most countries, Kantar said, but the rival operating system saw its fifth consecutive year of decline in the U.S.

Apple has also seen increasing strength in its associated services, according to Apple Marketing Chief Phil Schiller.

“November 2016 was a record breaker for the app store,” he said in a recent tweet, with the “highest monthly sales ever.”