Samsung and Apple were the winners in a Q3 smartphone market that dropped 20%

What happened

Counterpoint Research (CR) has just published its report regarding the global smartphone market for the third quarter of the year (July to September). Shipments dropped 20% compared to Q3 2025. Apple is a software and consumer electronics company based in Cupertino. Samsung is an electronics company based in Suwon.

The only winners in terms of growing their market shares were Samsung and Apple. Samsung led the pack with a 23% market share (compared to 19% in the year-ago quarter), while Apple was a close second with 22% (up from 18% in Q3 2025). They were followed by Xiaomi with 10% of the pie (down from 14%), Oppo with 9% (down from 12%), and vivo with 8% (down from 9%).