Apple is winning over the minds and hearts of Millennials and Gen Z in S. Korea by a huge factor over Samsung
It was reported earlier this month that South Korea only has two major smartphone OEMs being Samsung with 84% and Apple at 15% totaling 99%. Apple is gaining ground in South Korea with more high-end stores opening that appeal to a younger demographic. Their latest store, Apple Gangnam, opened on March 31, 2023 with a massive enthusiastic crowd attending as noted in our cover graphic.
Then in July, The Korea Herald posted a report titled "Young Koreans favor iPhones over Samsung Galaxy." The report covered a survey conducted by Gallup Korea. At present 69% of Korean adults own a Galaxy phone, with Apple's iPhone in second place with 23%.
Where a huge shift is now occurring is with younger millennials and Gen Z as noted in the survey chart below.
More specifically, among the younger generation, aged 18 to 29, iPhone’s share rises to 65 percent, double the Samsung's 32 percent, the survey found. This represents a 13 percent increase in iPhone use from last year and stands in sharp contrast to older cohorts, where Samsung holds strong with numbers above 70 percent. In the 40s age group, 78 percent used Galaxy compared to 18 percent for iPhone, with the gap growing even larger in older age groups.
In its analysis, the survey credited iPhone's appeal among young people to Apple's premium branding – for the same storage size, an iPhone 14 (128GB) costs 1,250,000 won ($989) compared to the Galaxy S23's 1,150,000 won. Introduction of Apple Pay, Apple’s mobile payment service, to Korea earlier this year was cited as another contributing factor.
A second report by The Korea Herald posted today found that the iPhone 15 sold better in Korean than Japan or China.
Apple’s latest iPhone 15 series is enjoying more popularity than its predecessor in Korea, bucking the lukewarm sales trend in neighboring countries such as China and Japan.
Sales of the latest iPhone lineup -- the iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max -- jumped 41.9 percent in the first month of its official release here on Oct. 13, compared to that of the iPhone 14 series from a year prior, according to market tracker Atlas Research and Consulting.
Sales of the smaller and cheaper iPhone 15, in particular, more than doubled during the same period, while the highest-priced iPhone 15 Pro Max saw a 42.3 percent growth in sales.
The iPhone 15 Pro made up almost 50 percent of the sales portion, followed by the iPhone 15 with 30.7 percent.
In Japan where consumers prefer smaller smartphones, sales of iPhone 12 and 13 Minis more than doubled in the first week of the new iPhone 15 launch, according to the Japanese daily Nikkei.
Korean observers are hoping that with the popularity of the iPhone growing in Korea that Apple will put their country in the first round of shipments for the iPhone 16. Being in the second tier of shipments this year angered many fans.
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