14 DAY TRIAL // It’s not a surprise that Windows phones are going extinct since not even Microsoft is committed to keeping Windows 10 Mobile alive, and the latest sales share data offered by Kantar confirm fewer and fewer buyers are interested in such devices these days.
Windows 10 Mobile has declined to nearly 0 percent sales share in all big markets in the three-month period ending March 2018 (versus the same quarter in 2017), and obviously, a recovery is pretty much impossible.
The drop is significant in nearly every market, and in Germany for instance, the sales share of Windows phones dropped to 0.8% during the said quarter.
In the UK and Spain, the platform fell to 0%, while in France it’s now at 0.6%. Overall, in the EU5 region Windows phones accounted for 0.6% of the phones sold, while Americans somehow were more attracted by Microsoft’s operating system and 1.5% of the buyers picked it, down just 0.3% from the previous year.
China share goes up
Windows phones are also going dark in Japan where they account for only 0.1% of the phones sold there, while in China they somehow increased 0.3% to 0.5%.
Sooner or later, Windows phones will disappear completely from the market, as the platform is currently in maintenance mode and only getting security patches. Microsoft will retire Windows 10 Mobile entirely in mid-2019 at which point Windows phones would no longer receive any kind of update.
In the meantime, Microsoft is believed to be working on a new type of mobile device supporting multiple form factors and running full Windows 10, but details in this regard are still in the unconfirmed stage. The company could take the wraps off this new device later this year as part of the Surface lineup, but without any official word said just yet, everything could change overnight.
