21% of smartphones carried the Samsung branding

Dec 28, 2016 09:56 GMT  ·  By

Smartphones are some of the best gifts during the holidays, which is why many retailers and carriers post promotions prior to Christmas Eve. A new report shows which smartphones found their way in most gifts under the Christmas tree.

As it happens every year, Flurry Analytics conducted a study on the most gifted smartphones and tablets during the holiday season, by taking a look at phone and app activation during the week leading up to Christmas day and the start of Hanukkah. Consequently, the study was conducted between December 19 and 25.

One of the main conclusions of the report is that for every Samsung device activated, Apple saw two iPhone activations. 44% of the gifted smartphones carried the Apple branding, compared to 21% for Samsung. The good news for Samsung is that its smartphones have grown in popularity by 1% compared to last year; not bad considering that the company’s mobile division has had a rough year, to say the least.

Motorola phones saw an activation rate of just 2%

Huawei and LG hold the third and fourth positions, with 3% and 2%, respectively, “which is remarkable, as both manufacturers do not have an individual device within the top 35 devices activated,” said the report.

The two manufacturers do offer a wide range of affordable smartphones and tablets, which surely contributed to this share. Amazon, Oppo, Xiaomi and Motorola each had a share of 2% out of all phone activations. Missing from the chart is Google with its Pixel and Pixel XL phones, which apparently didn’t manage to attract customers.

The report also reveals a trend regarding phablet devices and medium phones, showing that the popularity of the latter is gradually decreasing. In the week leading to the 2016 winter holidays, phablets recorded 37% of all activations, compared to 45% for medium phones and 9% for full-size tablets.

Phablet activation rate rose from 27% in the same week of last year and from 13% in 2014. 63% of all phones activated during the week prior to Christmas in 2014 were medium phones, compared to 54% last year.

Activation rates for smartphones (2 Images)

Most phones activated during the holidays were iPhones
Distribution of new device activation by display size
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