Smartphone numbers are in: iPhone sales exceed Windows Mobile sales for first time

Gartner's latest and greatest analysis of the global smartphone industry is in, and there are quite a few interesting nuggets tucked within all those percentages. For starters, the sector still managed to grow 11.5% in Q3 2008 compared to a year prior, but that increase is the smallest since it began tracking. Of course, given the current economic climate, we'd say it's a win to see any number not in the negative. Moving on, we see Nokia maintaining its numero uno status with 42.4% market share, though it did recognize a rare decline in sales of 3% year-on-year; as for RIM, its BlackBerry phone sales increased an amazing 81.7% in Q3. We're also clued in to why Apple was rumored to be hacking its iPhone production some 40% in Q4, as the company has some two million units of inventory built up in the supply channel. Finally, we're told that "for the first time (meaning in this quarter), iPhone sales exceeded sales of Microsoft Windows Mobile devices worldwide and in North America," and beyond that, "open-source initiatives like Android and Symbian Foundation [are set to] challenge Windows Mobile's licensing model in the short-term." Need we really reiterate how badly WinMo 7 is needed?

[inteller @ Dec 4th 2008 9:04AM]

of course this helps when you are unfairly in cahoots with the carrier to not subsidize WinMo phones as deeply as iPhones nor give them equal levels of promotion.

A winMo smartphone that is MORE than an iPhone? No, no funny business going on there.

[kjb434 @ Dec 4th 2008 9:57AM]

I agree.

WinMo phones are subsidized nearly as much, but also the customers for WinMo phone are business oriented and their phones are often subsidized by the workplace.

I still prefer WinMo because it is way more customizable than the iPhone. Touchscreen WinMo phones can have any interface you want. And if someone didn't make one you like, you can do it yourself. Hell, you can even get an iPhone interface for a WinMo phone. Then you'll get to cut/paste and send MMS!

[Mark Anderson @ Dec 4th 2008 10:30AM]

Very true.

And just to put this in context before the Apple happy fun club that passes itself off as the tech press gets too carried away...

1) This is one quarter's result which, as we know, was the 3G's launch quarter
2) RIM released nothing of note that quarter (perhaps some tail end Bold sales are in there but not a lot) and still beat the 3G so was El Jobs fibbing about selling more than RIM at the earnings call?
3) Next quarter 3G sales will drop and there's no other model to boost volume
4) Nokia release the 5800 which is a smartphone this quarter

Your fapping may commence now albeit at a reduced rate.

[Quix @ Dec 4th 2008 10:52AM]

Spare us, Mark. The only fapping going on here seems to be coming from you - some people seem to get a genuine thrill from their boiling Apple hate. Your constant anti-Apple propaganda grows tiresome.

Let's look at iPhone vs. Windows Mobile/Windows CE/PocketPC/Whatever-They're-Calling-It-This-Month in a year, hmm???

Troll Different.

[Jakob @ Dec 4th 2008 11:16AM]

Mark?

Probably true, but who the heck is 3G? Some new company, a new phone or a brand new 3G-string?

[esoterica @ Dec 4th 2008 12:19PM]

@kjb434, you can't possibly be serious that you think that what makes the iPhone great can be distilled as a skin (which is what I can only assume you meant by "get an iPhone interface"), even if the skins were to apply as anything other than glorified launchers for other non-skinned apps. The HTC TouchFlo 3D interface (skin), for example, IMO is better looking than the iPhone interface, but it's a complete usability disaster.

[JerseyBricklayer @ Dec 4th 2008 12:11PM]

Fuck WinMo!

[Squid7085 @ Dec 4th 2008 12:14PM]

I think you are wrong that there is nothing pushing the phone in the next quarter. I actually think next quarter could be the phones largest quarter. Apple has historically had very good Holiday quarters. The iPhone will dominate again. To deny the effect of the iPhone on the cell phone market is just silly, you can' hate it as much as you want, but for every person staying on WinMo, 3 more are moving to an iPhone, or even Android and other new platforms.

[McLovin @ Dec 4th 2008 12:17PM]

Wait one cotton-picken minute. Wasn't it just recently engadget reported that the iPhone surpassed BBs to snag 2nd place in the smartphone market. Leaving WM at 4th place? Something's not adding up, or am I just mistaken.

[Mark Anderson @ Dec 4th 2008 1:18PM]

@Quix:

I'm sorry, did the nasty man make you cry?

Look, sparky, I think it's a great achievement for Apple to shift that many units but headlines popping up in the tech journals are already proclaiming Apple as the saviour of the smartphone market and that's just bullshit. If you want to take quarterly sales in isolation then knock yourself out, I'd rather look at trends.

So, yes, lets look at it in a year and see what the figures say. I think Apple will sell a good number of units but like any smartphone most sales will be generated in the launch quarter with a tail off over the next year. That's just commercial reality.

@Jakob

lolicuwutudidthar!11!1

[Mark Anderson @ Dec 4th 2008 1:22PM]

@Squid

Thing is I don't hate the iPhone, it's a very good phone. However, if you're comparing a subscription based service to a holiday purchase item than I'm not sure that's a sensible thing to do. It may be the case that Apple shift more over the Xmas period but looking at sales of iPhone v1.0 over the same period - once you exclude sales in the UK, Germany and France - that didn't appear to be the case last year.

If they do then more power to them.

[UnixSystemsEngineer @ Dec 4th 2008 2:02PM]

Are you effing joking me? WinMo is an also-ran. It's as good as dead. You can get a Dash or Blackjack II or Q for free at my company, and nobody wants them. I thought it was just my Q that was bad, crashing constantly, but it looks like the Dash is just as bad -- my coworker's crashed 3 times yesterday at lunch alone.

Don't even try to blame this on some global conspiracy to promote the iPhone over WinMo. Microsoft as the victim just doesn't make sense.

[Squid7085 @ Dec 4th 2008 2:05PM]

It will be interesting indeed, I am basing it basically off pure intuition. The one thing I have to say is that the iPhone is more in line to compete with the touch this year, the price point last year was not really in the "give as a gift" range. This year with the phones going for $199 and being price competitive (minus service.) to the touch. Apple obviously realizes the significance, as they started selling the iPhone gift cards for this year. My point was really that the market that loves this phone (younger people) gets them as gifts, being in college now and being on a college campus, I have seen more iPhones in one place than I have anywhere else. And my little "market research" has a lot of people saying they asked for iPhones this season. We will know in 2009

[Dave @ Dec 5th 2008 12:44AM]

iPhone sales exceed Windows Mobile sales...so what? Obama's votes also exceeded McCain's votes. It still doesn't make the iPhone of Barry Obama a better leader for that matter!!!

[moe @ Dec 4th 2008 9:06AM]

in the words of Jobs himself, "the iphone is not a smartphone".

[cyrixm @ Dec 4th 2008 9:16AM]

It was not. Now - since SDK and AppStore - it definitely is.

[asg84 @ Dec 4th 2008 9:25AM]

yep, iphone is not a smartphone, its lacking some very basics features........although good to see some cool 3rd party apps

many buy iphone thinking it is flexible as a smartphone and get disappointed

[wud_e @ Dec 4th 2008 9:36AM]

LOL please tell me you are joking about C&P being a bad thing. C&P is more useful than it it is hurtful. Try using a PC or Mac without it.

[CJ @ Dec 4th 2008 10:24AM]

Cyrixm: Unfortunately, although the App store and SDK are a step forward, they don't make the iPhone a smartphone, not yet.

The app store is admittedly, great. No problems there. The SDK, on the other hand, is severely limited when it comes to usability, and previously mentioned (and griped constantly about) is the fact that there is a great deal of red tape to go through before a delelvoper is allowed to put their app on the iPhone. Not to mention there are several software limitations that plant the iPhone in the 'high (high) end featurephone' category

If you were to use a jailbroken iPhone as your model, I'd agree with you wholeheartedly, and therin lies the problem; if you need to hack open your phone in order to create the parameters needed for inclusion in the 'smartphone' (or indeed, any other) catergory, then it's less than ideal.

[Richard Lai @ Dec 4th 2008 10:41AM]

iEye is the reason for why marijuana should not be legalised.

[blore40 @ Dec 4th 2008 10:52AM]

Corrrect. It is a smartass phone

[Ray @ Dec 4th 2008 11:48AM]

Enjoy your multitasking... oh wait.

[Félix @ Dec 4th 2008 12:31PM]

I don't get why you law rank a Joke people....
First message posted by iEye is lame and no honnest, as there is no reasons not to implement copy paste in a martphone..
No law rank.

Second is humour and it gets low ranked... oO'

[Erwos @ Dec 4th 2008 9:06AM]

I'm not shocked. Microsoft hasn't made a serious update to Windows Mobile's UI in _years_, and the browser is just pathetic compared to the iPhones. Much as I like Windows Mobile, it's time to start aggressively targeting the consumer market - or the iPhone will start eating into that oh-so-valuable business market when WinMo loses popular mindshare. I am _hoping_ that Microsoft's acquisition of Danger will lead to a Zune phone of some sort. It doesn't need to be an iPhone killer - it just needs to be competitive. They got there with the Zune, so there is hope...

[Josh Ladella @ Dec 4th 2008 9:12AM]

too bad engadget doesnt support _italics_ and *bold* formatting :P

[cesium @ Dec 4th 2008 9:30AM]

Opera Mini. That is all.

[TubeTop100.com @ Dec 4th 2008 9:37AM]

Yeah, but with WiMo you could install Skyfire and/or Opera Mobile.

Which both support Flash and copy/paste.

Besides that, the HTC Diamonds alone sell better than the iPhones in Europe. Let alone all WiMo devices combined.

Couldn't care less about the US.

[cesium @ Dec 4th 2008 9:39AM]

Oops ya, Opera Mobile, not mini.

[Mark Anderson @ Dec 4th 2008 9:47AM]

1) Windows 6.1 was released in April.
2) Opera 9.5

But, hey, don't let facts stop you specualting.

[Sukhminder @ Dec 4th 2008 9:58AM]

Great comment. I would love to see Microsoft do to Windows Mobile what it did to the Zune. Let the Xbox and Zune team(s) (I'm probably wrong, but I think they are the same?) have a say with Windows Mobile. A Mobile Marketplace (a la Apps Store) and a Zune media interface (Akin to what Sony and Apple have done with their phone(s)) would be great.

I own an iPhone, but am looking forward to a WM device, I really enjoy the simplicity of the iPhone but *insert usual critiques*

[roach @ Dec 4th 2008 10:13AM]

The way Engadget reported iPhone sales, I thought it had already passed Winmo a long time ago. I guess heading like this "iPhone sells big, but not passed Winmo." wouldn't pass Steve Job's approval stage.

[chickenator @ Dec 5th 2008 2:40PM]

now where's Baller hiding?

[LiQuiD_FuSioN @ Dec 4th 2008 11:51AM]

Actually, when I see the WinMo phone compared to the iPhone in the picture.. I'm wondering why the iPhone's interface looks so bare. I don't mind the widgets or the background.

[leo @ Dec 4th 2008 12:24PM]

Erwos - you could've summarised your entire post by saying:


"How dya like THEM apples?"

[Flashpoint @ Dec 4th 2008 9:06AM]

a great day for iPhone fanboys indeed.

[SSS @ Dec 4th 2008 9:12AM]

What was it that Ballmer said about the iPhone before it came out? Was it something about the cost?

When will Microsoft get rid of that idiot and replace him with someone intelligent with a vision for the future of technology rather than a fat sales/marketing guy?

[Ryback @ Dec 4th 2008 9:44AM]

@SS
He's not fat. He's big boned!

[Zunavio @ Dec 4th 2008 10:25AM]

1888-GETS-GATES-BACK

[StalematE @ Dec 4th 2008 11:32AM]

you forgot sweaty...

[Squid7085 @ Dec 4th 2008 12:21PM]

Heh, he actually stated something about the price and that it would not gain a "Significant" market share. Citing he rather have his software in "80-90 percent (total crap) than just have 3-4 percent of the device share. I'm not going to lie, as much as I despise Bill Gates at times, his was as much the vision to Microsoft as Jobs is to Apple. They lost the heart when he left. The Get a Mac ads are getting a bit old, but its true, they are spending a bit too much on marketing rather than making a product people just want and talk about, which is something the iPhone has done. Word of Mouth and "Fad" marketing is the best there is.

[Sam Zebian @ Dec 4th 2008 1:50PM]

Yeah, someone who knows what they are doing. Someone who isn't trying to persuade you to buy something, but guides their company to create a product that almost needs no marketing because it's just so damn good. Someone who can come up with innovative ideas and be able to put them in real-life products that are sold within a few months or years.

Not creating a bunch of great product ideas in the Microsoft Labs and never implementing them into consumer products.

Microsoft comes up with great ideas all the time, but most of them are either not sold (still in development and then just never get sold) or they are barely marketed a all. Microsoft needs someone to spread their resources efficiently enough to not screw with their core products (Windows, Office, Xbox and Zune, in order of importance) but still be able to allow the company to take their innovative product ideas off the white board and into the store shelves! (or digital download 'lockers', yes that's what MS calls it, the digital 'locker'. Why not "file vault' or 'file storage', locker just sounds weird)

I'm not saying that MS doesn't know what they are doing. All I'm saying is that with Ballmer in the lead of the company (nothing wrong with Ballmer, he just doesn't seem to be right for the CEO. He should still have a high-ranking job at MS, but in an area of his expertise. Maybe he can help to fix Microsoft's marketing issues, since he's so good at Marketing. See, just because someone may seem not right for the job doesn't mean he should get fired, he could be put to use on something else instead.)
I'm just saying that MS needs someone fresh, someone new to lead the company. With Gates 'retired' (I'll use that term loosely with Gates, considering he still works around 20 hours a week at MS) (I believe it was 20 hours, might be wrong though).
Anyways, with Gates gone, Ballmer isn't going to be the guy that will be able to check up on all of the projects and products being worked on to see if there could be any adjustments made, he's not going to be able to fix some of the problems MS is going to face, and he's going to have some trouble managing MS. He's got enough problems to deal with now, and he might be able to do some or most of the things I just said he couldn't, but I bet you he won't do as well as a job that Gates has been doing.

That's why MS needs a new leader, to fix the problems from the past and presen, and to be prepared for the future of innovations and expectations they will have to meet.

I nominate myself. No lol jk, I'm only going to work for the Zune team, and I would probably never be qualified for the Job. Plus I'd have to work for ms for like 20+ years to reach that level of the company if I tried (which i hope I will be working for even longer than that at MS)
But yeah, I think, no I know I would do a good job as one of the higher management employees at Microsoft. There are a lot of people who are working at Microsoft (and some that are not) that probably want one of those higher ranking jobs already, so my chances of ever getting one are pretty slim.

Ahh well, let's hope that someone good at managing becomes Microsoft's CEO, or very high ranking employees. (I keep saying High-ranking, but it sounds like a military type of term. What other word would work?)

[Mike C @ Dec 4th 2008 9:12AM]

I hate incomplete statistics.

I have a hard time believing that was for all time sales on the iphone vs winmo phones. Quarterly? Yearly? Outsold on Tuesdays with a waxing Moon for people between 7 and 54 born under Virgo or Capricorn signs?

That article reeked of bias. I'm not doubting that the iPhone is kicking ass, I'm slowly becoming the only person I know without one, but unless they spell out what time frame they're look at. I remain skeptical.

[Aaron @ Dec 4th 2008 9:19AM]

The irony is that this piece is by Gartner, who are renowned for saying whatever Microsoft pay them to say.

I never believe anything they say since their "analysis" is always paid for by someone.

[Alan Strangis @ Dec 4th 2008 10:06AM]

Why is the Gartner report full of speculation about Windows Mobile, but doesn't show it's actual numbers?

More significant than YoY results is that in the iPhone 3G launch quarter, only Apple and WM devices outperformed in the market, with all others under performed.

http://wmpoweruser.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/q2vsq32.jpg

PS: any thread that has iEye gettin Highly Ranked for an anti A2DP C&P statement is just full of Kool Aid.

[Josh Ladella @ Dec 4th 2008 9:13AM]

no, you are second to gloat.

[ms @ Dec 4th 2008 9:16AM]

Microsoft is in trouble

[The Joker @ Dec 4th 2008 9:47AM]

I was about to vote him down until I looked-up "trouble" in Urban Dictionary and found out it means "rolling in huge piles of cash".

[Theli @ Dec 4th 2008 10:48AM]

"Microsoft is in trouble"

Cellphone buyers are quick to jump on the next new thing, and Windows Mobile hasn't been "new" or exciting for quite some time.
If Microsoft scrapped their mobile operating system and built something from the ground up they could reclaim their position. I don't think they are paying much attention to the smartphone market at the moment, though.

[Mobius_1 @ Dec 4th 2008 12:27PM]

Notice how "rouble" is a part of "trouble".

[Félix @ Dec 4th 2008 12:34PM]

@ Mobius : LMAO

Seriously microsoft has large amount of money (about 1/20th of Apple's but still twice as much as the whole Belgium) and windows Mobile 7 is almost (maybe someday) out.
So no they certainly are not in trouble.
(not that I care)