The latest numbers from market research firm IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker show that Apple remains the largest vendor in a declining tablet market, shipping 10.9 million iPads in the second quarter of 2015. While the iPad continues to be the best-selling tablet, its worldwide market share fell below 25% as Apple faced increased competition from low-cost rivals Lenovo, Huawei and LG.
Samsung continued to be the second largest tablet vendor with 7.6 million tablets shipped in the second quarter and 17% market share, a 12% year-over-year unit decline. Lenovo, Huawei and LG Electronics rounded off the top five, with 2.5 million, 1.6 million and 1.6 million global tablet shipments in the second quarter respectively. All other tablet vendors had a combined 45.6% market share.
iPad sales have declined for six consecutive quarters year-over-year in what has become a stagnated tablet market over the past few years, but that trend could be broken in a few months as Apple is expected to release up to three new iPads in time for the holiday shopping season: iPad Air 3, iPad mini 4 and the much-rumored 12.9-inch “iPad Pro” targeted at professional and enterprise users.
