Smartphone shipments fell 5.7 percent QoQ to 4.74 million units in Q3 2022 in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region.

The size of the smartphone market in the Gulf region was worth $1.93 billion in Q3 2022, an increase of 5.4 percent QoQ.

Feature phone shipments declined 8.1 percent to 0.48 million units in the Gulf region.

The size of feature phone market in the Gulf region totalled $8.42 million, down 17.0 percent.

Shipments of mobile phones to the Gulf region declined 5.9 percent quarter on quarter (QoQ) in Q3 2022 to total 5.23 million units.

“Premium price bands performed well in Q3 2022 due to the release of several popular flagship devices from Apple and Samsung, which explains the quarterly growth in value,” Akash Balachandran, research manager at IDC, said.

Samsung is the leading smartphone brand in unit terms in Q3 2022 with 47.6 percent share. Smartphone shipments of Samsung declined 7.2 percent QoQ.

Apple, with 16.8 percent share, saw its shipments decline of 0.8 percent QoQ, lower than previous expectations due to sales being bottle necked by supply constraints.

Xiaomi, a leading brand, accounted for 15.2 percent of the smartphone market in Q3 2022 but suffered a 5.1 percent QoQ decline in shipments with its focus on more midrange and high-end devices.

The smartphone market in the Gulf region is forecast to grow 13.8 percent QoQ in Q4 2022. Regional events like the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar will drive retail footfall in the region.

“5G devices accounted for 38.2 percent of smartphone shipments in Q3 and the technology is expected to become standard in mid-tier price bands among Android vendors. By the end of 2026, we expect that 5G devices will account for 82.6 percent of total GCC smartphone shipments,” Ramazan Yavuz, senior research manager at IDC, said.