IDC Q3 report is out, Samsung overtakes Apple in smartphones

It wasn’t actually a secret that Samsung has surpassed Apple in smartphone shipments for Q3 2011, but now the research firm IDC has confirmed just that. Samsung is now the smartphne king, putting Apple in second place, and Nokia in third

Put into perspective, 20 percent of all the smartphones in the world are Samsung branded, which is a huge leap over last years’ 8.8 percent. In contrast, Apple has dropped its smartphone share from 17 percent to 15 percent, and Nokia has been doing even worse, dropping from 28 percent to just 14 percent.

Speaking in raw numbers, Samsung has shipped 23.6 million smartphones, while Apple managed to ship 17.1 million units for the same period. The Taiwan based HTC managed to score in the top five for the first time in its history with a rise in shipments from 7.1 percent to 11 percent in just a year.

Ramon Llamas, senior research analyst at IDC also put his thoughts on the results.