Good news for smartphone manufacturers around the world.

Smartphone sales increased worldwide for the third consecutive quarter as Canalys reported a 12% increase in global sales of the device in the second quarter of 2024 compared to the same period last year.

This follows annual growth of 10% in the first quarter of 2024 and 8% in the fourth quarter of 2023. Shipments fell 1% in the third quarter of 2023, the latest reported by Canalys.

Smartphone sales have improved for 3 consecutive quarters, which is good news for manufacturers to push further.

Apple narrowed the gap with leader Samsung in the second quarter as the Korean company captured 18% of the market, down 3% from the 21% it had a year earlier. For Samsung, the second quarter was a quiet one after the company launched a series of new flagship products in the first quarter, including the Galaxy S24, S24+ and S24 Ultra with Galaxy AI integration. In the current third quarter, the Korean company will release new folding screen smartphone models, Galaxy Z Fold6 and Z Flip6.

As for Apple, the company lost 1% of its market share, falling from 17% to 16%. Despite the decline, Apple was “less bad” than Samsung, allowing the company to be only 2% behind its top competitor. Apple will remain quiet on the smartphone front until the end of the third quarter, where the company plans to launch the iPhone 16 series and will release them to the market before the end of September.

Samsung is still the king in the smartphone market in the second quarter of 2024.

As for Xiaomi, this company did not miss the opportunity to rise close to its competitors and threaten Apple's number 2 position by capturing 15% of the market share in the second quarter. This makes Xiaomi only 1% behind. Apple returned to market share after increasing by 2%. Vivo ranked next with 9% market share (up from 8%) and Transsion ranked fifth with 9% market share, equivalent to the level achieved in the same period last year.

Canalys research director Amber Liu expects smartphone sales to continue to grow thanks to advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI). This is completely plausible as the Galaxy AI launched earlier this year boosted the Galaxy S24 series. While Apple Intelligence will be available to owners of the iPhone 15 Pro and the entire iPhone 16 series once the stable version of iOS 18 is officially released in September.