Late yesterday global smartphone shipments were reported on for calendar Q4 2019 by Strategy Analytics. While shipments held steady at zero growth to reach 375 million units in the fourth quarter of 2019, Apple's record breaking quarter was able to power their market share to take a leap forward to become the number one smartphone vendor in world for calendar Q4 ahead of Samsung and Huawei.  

Neil Mawston, Executive Director at Strategy Analytics:

"Apple iPhone shipments rose 7 percent annually from 65.9 million units worldwide in Q4 2018 to 70.7 million in Q4 2019. This was Apple’s best growth performance since 2015.

Apple’s global smartphone market share has lifted from 18 percent to 19 percent in the past year. Apple is recovering, due to cheaper iPhone 11 pricing and healthier demand in Asia and North America."

For more details about Apple's competitor, read the full Strategy Analytics report. Note that the statistics from Strategy Analytics for Q4 2019 may differ from future reports from IDC and/or Gartner when they arrive. Each company uses different statistical methodologies.