iPad Sales Declined But Still Lead The Global Tablet Market

IDC analysts said in a research report that Apple continues to lead the global tablet market, although iPad sales fell in the latest quarterly earnings, and compared to the overall market's 8.6% decline in the third quarter, the iPad didn't lose too much market share.

Apple announced in its quarterly earnings report on Friday that it sold 9.7 million iPads in the third quarter, a decrease from the 10.3 million units in the third quarter of 2017. Despite a drop of about 6% in sales, it is still much higher than other competitors on the market. IDC believes that because of the iPad introduced back in March, it help drive sales of the tablets.

The refreshed $329 iPad with Pencil support that launched in late March continued to drive volume although it was unable to maintain the same momentum from the third quarter of 2017 as that was the first time in a while that Apple had released a lower cost iPad. iPad Pro saw year-on-year declines in anticipation of a refresh at the beginning of the fourth quarter, which bodes well for Apple through the end of the year.

Apple's share in tablet market was 26.6%, up from 25.9% in the same period last year. The increase in Apple's market share was attributed to the decline of other rivals in the market. On the IDC list, Apple is still far ahead of its primary rival Samsung, which has sold 5.3 million tablet in the third quarter of 2018, with a market share of 14.6%.