Share of tablet shipments worldwide in 1st quarter 2025 and 1st quarter 2026, by vendor
The tablet market is the one device category where Apple is not merely a leader but a dominant force. In the first quarter of 2026, Apple iPad held about 40 percent of worldwide tablet shipments, more than twice the share of its nearest rival. This report compares tablet market share by vendor between the first quarter of 2025 and the first quarter of 2026, showing who gained, who lost, and how Apple extended its lead. The year-over-year picture is unusually clear-cut. Apple rose while most rivals fell, a simple and stark divide. Few quarters produce such a clean separation of winners and losers. The Q1 2026 results drew a sharp line through the field. Apple and a couple of Android risers pulled clear of the rest. The middle of the pack simply gave way. Only the very strongest vendors held firm. Everyone else surrendered some ground. The flat market left no room for the weak to grow.
The headline is that Apple grew stronger. Its share rose from about 37 percent in the first quarter of 2025 to roughly 40 percent a year later, on shipments of 14.8 million iPads, up nearly 8 percent. The full ranking of tablet vendors is tracked in our tablet vendor market share analysis; here the focus is on the year-over-year shift between these two quarters. The comparison isolates the latest competitive moves. By holding the season constant, it shows the true underlying trend. Year-on-year is the fairest way to read a seasonal market. It strips out the holiday swings that distort raw quarters. That makes the year-on-year shift the most reliable signal. Seasonal quarters can mislead; annual comparisons rarely do. The like-for-like view tells the real story.
Beneath Apple, the field reshuffled. Lenovo and Huawei posted strong growth, while Samsung and Xiaomi declined. The overall market was essentially flat, with total shipments of about 37 million units in each quarter, as the post-pandemic replacement cycle cooled. Apple strengthening grip on a stagnant market is the story of the year, a dominance reflected in our Apple did not just hold its lead; it widened it, a dominance reflected in our iPad share of Apple revenue analysis.
A note on the data. Shares are based on units shipped, in percent, drawn from IDC and Omdia trackers. The two firms differ slightly in their exact figures, and shipments for smaller vendors are approximate. The comparison covers the first quarter of 2025 and the first quarter of 2026, a clean year-over-year window that isolates the latest competitive shifts. Comparing the same quarter a year apart removes seasonal noise. Tablet sales swing with holidays and school terms, so like-for-like matters. The same-quarter comparison keeps the playing field level. It is the cleanest read on who is really gaining ground. No other comparison cuts through the noise so well.
Tablet Vendor Share and Shipments, Q1 2025 vs Q1 2026
| Vendor | Share Q1 2026 | Share Q1 2025 | Units Q1 2026 | Units Q1 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple | 40.1% | 37.2% | 14.8M | 13.7M |
| Samsung | 16.5% | 19.0% | 6.1M | 7.0M |
| Lenovo | 9.5% | 7.6% | 3.5M | 2.8M |
| Huawei | 8.4% | 7.6% | 3.1M | 2.8M |
| Xiaomi | 7.0% | 8.1% | 2.6M | 3.0M |
| Others | 18.5% | 20.5% | 6.9M | 7.6M |
The table lists each leading tablet vendor share and shipments in the first quarter of 2025 and the first quarter of 2026, along with the change. It shows Apple extending its lead, Lenovo and Huawei gaining, and Samsung and Xiaomi slipping. Sorting the columns highlights the divide between the vendors that grew and those that shrank over the year. The gap between winners and losers was wide. Three vendors grew while three shrank, with little middle ground. The market split cleanly into risers and fallers. There was almost no middle ground between them. The divide between risers and fallers was unusually sharp. Vendors landed firmly on one side or the other.
One Vendor Towers
Seen as a snapshot, the first quarter of 2026 tablet market is overwhelmingly shaped by one company. Apple 40 percent share towers over Samsung at about 17 percent, Lenovo near 10 percent, Huawei around 8 percent and Xiaomi at 7 percent. No other category of consumer device is so thoroughly led by a single vendor. Apple share dwarfs anything seen in phones or PCs. The iPad lead is unmatched across Apple lineup. No other product owns its category so fully. The iPad is Apple clearest market win. Nothing else in the Apple lineup leads its category so decisively.
This concentration sets tablets apart from smartphones. In phones, Apple holds only about 18 percent, neck and neck with Samsung, as shown in our smartphone market share by vendor analysis. In tablets, Apple share is more than double that, and its lead over the second-placed vendor is enormous. The iPad is Apple strongest position in any hardware market. No other Apple product leads its category so decisively. Not the iPhone, not the Mac, not the Watch comes close. Tablets are where Apple dominance is most complete. The iPad outshines every other product in its lane. It is the clearest example of Apple category dominance. No competitor has come close in over a decade.
The reason is the structure of the market. The premium tablet segment, where Apple competes, is far larger relative to the whole than the premium smartphone segment, and Android tablets are fragmented across many vendors and seen by many buyers as secondary devices. The result is a market where the iPad is the default choice, a dominance that anchors our Buyers treat the iPad as the default tablet, a dominance that anchors our Apple revenue by segment analysis.
Shipments Compared
Measured in units rather than share, the picture is just as clear. Apple shipped 14.8 million iPads in the first quarter of 2026, up from 13.7 million a year earlier, a gain of nearly 8 percent in a flat market. Every unit Apple added came at the expense of rivals, since the overall market barely grew. Apple gains had to come straight out of rivals volumes. Every extra iPad sold meant a lost Android sale. The zero-sum quarter favoured the strong. Weak vendors had nowhere to hide.
Among the other vendors, the unit trends diverged sharply. Lenovo shipments jumped by roughly a quarter and Huawei by about a tenth, while Samsung fell more than 10 percent and Xiaomi nearly 14 percent. The market did not grow, so these were zero-sum shifts, with the gainers taking share directly from the losers. In a flat market, that is the only way to grow. Share had to be seized rather than created.
The unit figures underline how concentrated the growth was. With the total market flat at about 37 million units, only a handful of vendors, Apple, Lenovo and Huawei, actually grew, while the rest contracted. In a stagnant market, share gains require taking volume from competitors, a dynamic that favours the strongest brands, as our Stagnant markets reward incumbents, a dynamic that favours the strongest brands, as our tech revenue comparison analysis shows.
Growth Diverges
Ranked by year-over-year shipment growth, the winners and losers are stark. Lenovo led with growth of around 25 percent, followed by Huawei near 11 percent and Apple at almost 8 percent. On the other side, Xiaomi fell about 14 percent and Samsung roughly 13 percent, the steepest declines among the major vendors. Both lost ground while the leaders pulled away. The gap between top and bottom widened further. Strength and weakness pulled the field apart.
Lenovo surge reflects an aggressive push into both consumer and education tablets, with new models and pull-forward shipments ahead of expected price increases. Huawei growth, despite restrictions, came from new launches and strength in its home market. Both gained at the expense of Samsung and Xiaomi, which faced intense price competition. The budget end of the market proved brutally competitive. Thin margins left little room for weaker players. Price wars punished the cheapest tablets hardest. The squeeze fell most heavily on budget models. Cheap tablets had the least room to absorb pressure.
Samsung decline is the most striking, given it is the largest Android tablet vendor. It faced heavy promotional pressure and a slowdown in commercial projects, losing both share and volume. Xiaomi, smaller and more exposed to the budget segment, fell even faster, a vulnerability that contrasts with Apple premium resilience in our Apple iPhone revenue analysis.
The Order of Vendors
Ranked by share in the first quarter of 2026, the order is Apple, Samsung, Lenovo, Huawei and Xiaomi, with all other vendors together making up the remainder. Apple 40 percent is more than double Samsung 17 percent, and the gap between first and second is larger than the entire share of the third, fourth and fifth vendors combined. That is an extraordinary margin for any market leader. Few companies dominate a category so completely. The iPad rule over tablets is near-total. No rival approaches its scale.
This ranking has been stable at the top for years, with Apple and Samsung locked into first and second. The movement is further down, where Lenovo has overtaken Huawei and Xiaomi to secure a clear third place. The battle for the lower podium positions is where most of the competitive action now happens. The lower podium is where the real fight unfolds. Lenovo, Huawei and Xiaomi jostle constantly for position. The order beneath the top two keeps reshuffling.
The stability at the top reflects Apple structural advantages: a premium brand, a tightly integrated ecosystem and a tablet that doubles as a productivity device. No Android vendor has been able to challenge the iPad at the high end, leaving them to compete among themselves for the remaining share, a pattern of deeply entrenched leadership at the very top. The top two positions look unassailable for now. No challenger is positioned to displace either. The leadership has calcified at the very top. Apple and Samsung look locked into first and second. Their grip on the top has held for years. No challenger looks ready to break it. The top two seem firmly entrenched.
Points Gained and Lost
Looking at the change in share points rather than units sharpens the picture. Apple gained almost 3 points of share, the largest single swing, while Lenovo added nearly 2 points and Huawei a fraction. Samsung lost about 2.5 points, the biggest decline, with Xiaomi and the smaller vendors also slipping. The weakest players lost the most ground. Pressure compounded fastest at the bottom of the table.
These share-point shifts capture the redistribution of a flat market. Because the total did not grow, every point Apple and Lenovo gained came directly from Samsung, Xiaomi and the long tail of smaller vendors. The market did not expand; it simply reallocated share toward the strongest performers. The flat market funnelled gains to the leaders. Strength attracted strength as the market stalled. Consolidation accelerates when growth stops.
The direction of the share-point changes points to a market consolidating around its leaders. Apple and Lenovo, the two clearest winners, strengthened their positions, while the rest fragmented further. If the trend continues, the tablet market may become even more top-heavy, a concentration that mirrors the premium tilt in our The strong got stronger, a concentration that mirrors the premium tilt in our Apple Services revenue analysis.
One Brand, 40 Percent
Setting Apple against the entire rest of the market shows the scale of its dominance. With 40 percent of all tablet shipments, Apple alone ships more iPads than the next four vendors, Samsung, Lenovo, Huawei and Xiaomi, very nearly combined. The other 60 percent is split among a crowd of Android vendors. None of them comes anywhere near the iPad alone. Apple single share exceeds its four nearest rivals. That dominance is rare anywhere in technology. It sets the tablet market apart entirely.
This view underlines how unusual the tablet market is. In most device categories, the leader holds a plurality but faces strong rivals. In tablets, Apple holds a commanding share that no single competitor approaches, and its lead has been widening rather than shrinking, a strength that supports the premium strategy in our Apple total revenue analysis.
The Apple-versus-everyone framing captures the essential shape of the tablet market: one dominant premium brand on one side, and a fragmented field of Android makers on the other. While Android tablets collectively outsell the iPad, no single Android vendor comes close, leaving Apple as the clear and growing leader, a position that underpins our big tech revenue comparison analysis.
Concentration at the Top
The top five vendors, Apple, Samsung, Lenovo, Huawei and Xiaomi, together hold more than 80 percent of the global tablet market, leaving under 20 percent to all other brands. The concentration is high, and it is rising as the leading vendors take share from the long tail of smaller makers.
Within that top five, the structure is lopsided. Apple alone accounts for half of the top-five total, with the other four sharing the rest. This is very different from the smartphone market, where the top five are more evenly matched, and it reflects the iPad singular grip on the premium tablet segment.
The remaining share, under 20 percent, is spread across many smaller brands, including Amazon with its Fire tablets, plus regional and budget vendors. None holds more than a few percent, and their collective share has been shrinking as the top five consolidate, a long-tail squeeze familiar from our mobile operating system market share analysis.
Where Apple Is Strongest
Comparing Apple share across device categories reveals how exceptional its tablet position is. Apple holds about 40 percent of tablets but only around 18 percent of smartphones and roughly 9 to 10 percent of personal computers. The iPad is by far Apple strongest hardware position by market share.
This contrast is revealing. In phones, Apple competes head to head with Samsung and a host of Android brands; in PCs, it is a premium niche player behind Windows machines. Only in tablets does Apple command an outright dominant share, a position no rival has been able to seriously contest for over a decade.
The reason tablets favour Apple so heavily is that the category is more premium-skewed and less fragmented at the top than phones or PCs. Buyers who want a tablet overwhelmingly default to the iPad, while Android tablets are scattered across many vendors and price points. The result is a category that punches well above its weight in the Apple hardware business.
A Steady Grip
Apple tablet share has been remarkably steady over recent years, hovering between roughly 37 and 42 percent quarter after quarter. After the pandemic tablet boom faded, the iPad held its dominant position while the overall market shrank and then stabilised, and in early 2026 Apple share has edged toward the top of its range.
This steadiness is itself a sign of strength. Through a volatile period of pandemic surge, post-pandemic slump and tentative recovery, Apple share barely wavered, while Android vendors traded places below it. The iPad has proved the most stable position in a turbulent market, an anchor of remarkable consistency for the Apple hardware business.
In the most recent quarters, Apple share has even ticked upward, reaching 40 percent and beyond as Lenovo and Huawei grew at Samsung expense rather than Apple. The iPad is not just holding its lead but slowly extending it, a resilience that helps explain the strength of Apple overall business and its place in the premium device market.
The tablet market share story from the first quarter of 2025 to the first quarter of 2026 is one of Apple extending an already commanding lead. Its share rose from about 37 to 40 percent, on nearly 8 percent shipment growth, in a market that was otherwise flat. Lenovo and Huawei grew strongly, while Samsung and Xiaomi declined.
More than any single figure, it is the scale of Apple dominance that defines the tablet market. Holding 40 percent of shipments, more than double its nearest rival and far above its share in phones or PCs, the iPad is Apple strongest hardware position anywhere. As the market consolidates around its leaders, Apple grip looks set to tighten further, a dominance that anchors the wider Apple story in our biggest companies by market value analysis.
Frequently Asked Questions: Tablet Market Share by Vendor
Apple is by far the largest tablet vendor in 2026. In the first quarter of 2026, the iPad held about 40 percent of worldwide tablet shipments, on 14.8 million units shipped, up nearly 8 percent year over year. This is more than double the share of the second-largest vendor, Samsung, at about 17 percent. Apple has led the tablet market since the iPad launched, and its dominance has been growing rather than shrinking.
Apple held about 40 percent of the worldwide tablet market in the first quarter of 2026, up from roughly 37 percent in the first quarter of 2025. It shipped 14.8 million iPads, a year-over-year increase of nearly 8 percent. This is Apple's strongest position in any hardware category: far above its roughly 18 percent share in smartphones and its 9 to 10 percent share in personal computers.
Apple grew its share from about 37 to 40 percent and its shipments by nearly 8 percent. Lenovo was the fastest grower, up around 25 percent, and Huawei rose about 11 percent. On the other side, Samsung fell roughly 13 percent and Xiaomi about 14 percent. Because the overall market was flat at about 37 million units, the gains by Apple, Lenovo and Huawei came directly at the expense of Samsung and Xiaomi.
Apple holds about 40 percent of tablets but only around 18 percent of smartphones. The difference comes from market structure. The premium segment, where Apple competes, is a larger part of the tablet market than of the smartphone market, and Android tablets are fragmented across many vendors and often seen as secondary devices. As a result, the iPad is the default tablet choice for most premium buyers, while no single Android vendor can challenge it at the high end.
In the first quarter of 2026, Lenovo grew fastest among major tablet vendors, with shipments up about 25 percent year over year, driven by aggressive expansion in consumer and education tablets. Huawei grew about 11 percent, helped by new launches and home-market strength, and Apple grew almost 8 percent. By contrast, Samsung and Xiaomi both declined, by roughly 13 and 14 percent respectively, in a flat overall market.
The global tablet market was about 37 million units per quarter in early 2026, essentially flat year over year, after a post-pandemic boom faded and the replacement cycle cooled. For the full year, IDC has forecast tablet shipments of around 139 million units in 2026, a decline of roughly 9 percent, partly due to a looming memory-component shortage expected to raise prices. The market is mature and no longer growing strongly.
The tablet market is roughly flat to slightly shrinking. In the first quarter of 2026, shipments were about 37 million units, essentially unchanged from a year earlier. After a surge during the pandemic, demand cooled as the replacement cycle slowed. Looking ahead, analysts expect a decline of around 9 percent for the full year 2026, driven mainly by memory-component shortages that are pushing up prices across the personal computing market.
The top five tablet vendors in the first quarter of 2026 were Apple (about 40 percent), Samsung (about 17 percent), Lenovo (near 10 percent), Huawei (around 8 percent) and Xiaomi (about 7 percent). Together they hold more than 80 percent of the global market. Apple alone accounts for about half of that top-five total, an unusually lopsided concentration compared with the more evenly matched smartphone market.
Samsung, the largest Android tablet vendor, lost about 13 percent of its shipments year over year in the first quarter of 2026 and saw its share fall by roughly 2.5 points. It faced intense promotional and price pressure in the mass market, along with a slowdown in commercial and education projects compared with a year earlier. Rivals like Lenovo and Huawei, growing aggressively, took share directly from Samsung in a flat overall market.
In the first quarter of 2026, Apple iPad held about 40 percent of worldwide tablet shipments, meaning Android tablets collectively accounted for the other roughly 60 percent. However, that Android share is split among many vendors, including Samsung, Lenovo, Huawei, Xiaomi, Amazon and others, none of which holds more than about 17 percent. So while Android tablets together outsell the iPad, the iPad is by far the single largest tablet platform and brand.
IDC Worldwide Quarterly Personal Computing Device Tracker and Omdia tablet research - Source for tablet shipment market share by vendor.
IDC Personal Computing Device Tracker - Reference for tablet shipments, vendor share and market forecasts.
