The iPad boosted its market share in the final quarter of last year, achieving very slight growth as the tablet market as a whole declined, reports IDC.
The company attributes Apple’s ‘solid lead’ to a balance of entry-level and iPad Pro shipments.
In particular, with consumer sales falling and only the enterprise and education markets showing any signs of growth, the iPad Pro range is expected to become increasingly important.
Apple’s iPad shipments increased slightly from 13.1M to 13.2M, but because it achieved this marginal growth in a declining market, its share climbed from 24.3% in Q4 2016 to 26.6% in the final quarter of 2017.
IDC’s definition of tablets is broad, covering a mix of what it terms ‘slates’ and ‘detachables,’ the iPad Pro spanning the two as a keyboard can be attached to the iPad Pro range. The company reports that the detachable market grew 10.3%, but sharp falls in slate shipments meant that the tablet market as a whole declined 7.9%.
IDC says that Samsung may struggle this year.
IDC recently reported that Mac shipments were up 7.3% despite a tough US market.
