Smartphones Outsell PCs for the First Time Ever
Smartphones have outsold PCs for the first time ever.
It sometimes fun to compare apples to oranges, right? So with that in mind, IDC is reporting that the last quarter saw smartphones outsell PCs worldwide. According to IDC, consumer electronics manufacturers shipped 100.9 million smartphones from October through to December 2010. This represents an 87 percent jump from a year earlier. On the other hand, PC shipments were weaker than initially expected and amounted to 92.1 million, just a 3 percent increase.
Though it’s impressive growth for the smartphone industry, it’s not exactly a shocking development. With smartphone and mobile technology moving at such a hair-raising pace, it seems like newer, better, faster phones are being pushed every other month. People can’t help but want the next big thing, and with so many new phones out there, more people than ever are choosing to buy smartphones.
Comparing this gotta-have-it atmosphere to the PC industry seems a little redundant. Not only are people using smartphones and PCs for very different tasks (it’s not like we’re comparing netbooks to notebooks, here), most have a tendency to choose a PC they know will last them a few years. There’s also the point that smartphones are significantly cheaper than PCs. Even if people vow to keep the same phone for a few years, a nice juicy sale could change their mind very quickly.
All that said, it's impressive that a new industry, like the smartphone industry, could find it's footing and reach levels similar to that of the PC industry in just a couple of years.
Read more on Yahoo! News.
everyone wants a smartphone if they have to get a cell phone.
cellphones go obsolete faster than computers, thanks in part to apple.
However, i like that the comparison here is "apples to oranges". Smartphones may be outselling pc's, but they cant exactly replace them. At least not until you can fit 500GB-1TB of storage on there and connect both hd monitors and a full size keyboard. When that becomes the case, mobile phones may replace pc's for mainstream users. Until then, nothing beats a nice big monitor with a full size keyboard and a powerful desktop, at least thats my opinion
screen size is getting bigger more cores and speedy processors better graphics, its just getting better and better.
Careful giving all the credit to Google. They had an awfully good model from a certain fruit company to start from and improve upon. While I agree Android is a very good OS and has many many improvements over iOS, I would have been interested to see what it would have looked like had they not had a good example. I also agree Android is driving sales far more then Apple simply due to their distribution model.
For gamers and enthusiasts its another matter. Many buy upgrades frequently and i wonder how much all those sales that count as in an apple/oranges comparison like this - likely none due to its not a complete new system.
umm...everyone has different needs. Yours might be simple, others is not.
I game, and no smart phone can run BC2 or Crysis.
MILLIONS of people WORK on PCs and use them for MANY different things.
How do you think your Smartphone OS and apps are developed?
There will ALWAYS be MUCH need to buy a PC. MMMMKAY