Canalys: Around 2.4 million Windows Phones shipped in Q1 2011

May 4, 2011 | By Surur

Canalys has revealed some market share numbers for Q1 2011. While they did not reveal the exactly number of Windows phones shipped, they did allude to it, saying “ Samsung also shipped nearly 3.5 million bada operating system-based smart phones, outperforming total shipments of Windows Phone devices by more than a million units.”

Of course more than 2 million devices shipped does not automatically translate to those devices being in the hands on consumers and at present likely only Microsoft could tell us exactly how many Windows phones have so far been activated.

Also of note for Windows Phone 7 watchers is that Nokia shipped 24.2 million units, and remained the number 1 vendor in 28 countries. The transition of the largest phone OEM worldwide to Windows phone 7 is expected to boost numbers significantly.

Read the full report at Canalys here.

About Surur

Site Admin and Windows Phone enthusiast, he has been using Windows Mobile devices since before they were called PocketPC’s. He is currently sporting a HTC 7 Trophy.

Tagged market share, news, windows phone 7

dsole

The numbers actually aren't very good.

To be remotely successful, it would have needed a few million units sold to consumers and activated at launch time. After launch, it would need a steady and continued increase in sales over time.

The wholesale number of shipped units is way below that, and those may have just been moved from one warehouse to another, with a buy-back guarantee between Microsoft and the carriers.

Windows Phone needs to do much much better. I think at this stage, Nokia is the only real hope.

GP007

WP hasn't been in the news much and needs a new round of hardware more than anything. The reason Android gained so much is the steady release of new phones often, and not only at the highend.

Right now WP doesn't have the low end market which bada and most android phones are sold, Nokia will bring that to the table. It's also why Mango brings support for lower clocked (800Mhz) snapdragons to the spec. The rest is marketing and time, no one, even MS, expected a blockbuster sales showing with the first release. This is a long road and a young, still growing market. We'll have a better idea after Mango lands and MS can do more agressive advertising once all the big name features that it's lacking now are taken care of. 7.5 is what WP should've RTMed with but MS didn't have the ability to wait another year and a half.

xXx

It looks like you are trying to find excuses for WP7 not doing well. Not enough hardware, doesn't have low end market, need Nokia and Mango, etc…. If so, MS should pull up the socks. Why take so damn long for Mango? Can't they release Mango in stages instead to create more news?

rsg

Why does any company take so long to release major updates?
Rico

While I think that future updates will indeed be smoother, the reality is that the update process is closer to Android than iOS. If they were to release a number of smaller updates they'd be held up by carriers and devices across the board would have a number of different OS versions leading to fragmentation issues early on. It's a painful wait for Mango, but for the sake of the platform I think I'd rather have it this way than to see a number of smaller updates waiting in carriers' testing queues.

oslik

Yes, it resembles the Android update process more than the iOS one. It has to. Because Microsoft is more like Google than Apple.

Sure, WP is not Open Source and MS rules its universe. But the most important relationship in the mobile world is the axis Carrier – HW producer. Independent SW vendors, even OS vendors, are unwelcomed guests.
oslik

In fact, carriers hate ecosystem providers, because they want to take their place. No chance, of course, the've already got it.

Brian

Microsoft may not have expected blockbuster sales, but I do think they expected much better than what they are actually seeing. They certainly had their US stores filled with employees and press for the launch day crowds that never materialized. And their marketing expenditures were far from lackluster (even though the results were).

bobk

By the end of the year, they'll be over 10 million Windows Phones out there. Then Nokia and Mango will give WP7 a big boost. Shortly after, Windows 8 tablets will finally be out. Metro will be everywhere. I wouldn't worry.

Gadgetebz

100% Agree with this !!! I made this point in the XDA Forum that Nokia is a Brand like RIM and Apple and has such will get more interest and more loyalty from consumers based on name only…. Also agree Windows Phone possibly can`t get to no. 1 in Europe and North America. But in the growing markets of Asia, Africa and Latin America Windows Phone could achieve no.1 status with Nokia.

xXx

Asia markets are always slow….. With Android heating up now, and Android is having so many phone makers, I doubt just Nokia alone will save WP7.

Ram

Indian subcontinent, Africa are totally Nokia. If you think Asia is only china and its neighbors, you are totally wrong. Asia includes second highly populated country on the face of the earth, and guess what Nokia rules there not Android or some cheap plastic.

Just Visiting

+1. Totally agree. I made this very point about the Nokia brand name at Conversations@Nokia, and MyNokiaBlog. Of course, my comments were met with vitriol by the Symbian OS diehards, but the truth is the truth. WP7 is a great OS, but the WP OS will benefit exponentially because of the iconic Nokia brand name.
rsg

Very well put.

The OS will do very well, and Nokia will have a "new look" to tout with the new line of post-Symbian phones.

Most people won't care what OS is on the phone – the Nokia brand will be a major factor.

Nokia could well continue to ship just as many handsets when they launch WP7, which would be a huge boost for Microsoft and the OS's numbers. Position #3 could come sooner than expected.
chinch

Still no Verizon – 6 months after USA launch – is a killer in the USA. That is 1/2 the contract mobile phone users and simply a huge untapped market. Sprint with only a clunky qwerty phone doesn't help either.

zzz

MS must have signed some kind of a semi-exclusive deal with AT&T like RIM did for Torch.

Personally I think MS and Samsung should have done what Samsung did with their first Galaxy phones last year — release a Focus model for every carrier. Most people don't realize it but the Focus with WP7 as OS was/is the best smartphone out there. They would have sold 4x more phones and gained much bigger momentum and mind share at this point. HTC is okay but I hope Samsung plays bigger role going forward because I think Samsung is a notch above HTC when it comes to phones.

Brian

I doubt there is any kind of exclusive, more likely a little payback from Verizon for the mess that was Kin.

zzz

Then how do you explain only the qwerty device for Sprint? And no Focus (flagship model) equivalent for Tmobile?

What I heard is that Verizon got really pissed off when they lost the WP7 deal to AT&T. I think the Kin debacle (due to lack of attractive data plan) may have been partially a result of that, not the other way around.

Brian

The lack of models is due to the poor sales. Manufacturer's are already splitting the small WP7 pot over about 10 different models – that leaves a pretty small number of handset sales per model. It's the same reason we see lots of Android handset announcments and nothing for WP7 (manufacturers go where the sales are).

As for Kin, the debacle was when Microsoft decided part way in that the Sidekick OS need to be re-written around Windows CE and delayed things a year.

I doubt there is any kind of exclusive deal issue with WP7 – it all comes down to weak sales.
oslik

Unfortunately, I have to agree. WP7 is not Kin because of strong Microsoft's commitment. They know they must succeed. And they will, this is more important for them than XBox, which has experienced similar story.____But the market reaction to WP is so far ice-cold.
applesucks

Thats because there are to many iNaives in the world.
You know, someone that will buy anything with a lowercase i infront of the name and made by Apple. SAD
Brian

It has nothing to do with naive customers – Apple quite simply offers customers a better ecosystem. Calling Apple customers stupid names doesn't change the fact thatt he WP7 ecosystem so far is weak.

Haters of all things Apple like to point to the recent "Location-Gate" but Apple has already shipped an update to remove the location data stored on the phone while Microsoft still hasn't delivered NoDo to everyone.

Brian

The thing is we have seen a lot of sales incentives for WP7 handsets – discounts, BOGO, free XBox, free Zunepass, etc.

As for Asia that market is growing fast – but the other big players are already there (Apple's highest grossing stores are in China) and eating into Nokia's share. Don't get me wrong, Nokia will help WP7, but by the time the start to do this they will be a much smaller player in the smartphone space.
bobk

Your estimates are far from credible. Since, Sprint didn't launch WP7 till mid March, and Verizon won't ship till mid May.
Brian, we all know you want Windows Phone to fail. It won't. Between Nokia and Windows 8, Metro will be on mobile devices everywhere. I wouldn't be surprised to see more deals between RIM and Microsoft also.
Brian

The point is not the specific bug, but the timely way it was fixed once it was brought to light.

bobk

Apple's response to Locationgate is nothing to be proud of. The fix that Apple released still does not encrypt the location data! You'll have to wait for that in next major release. It also took Apple seven days to even make a statement to the press! Jobs then blamed users for being "confused". Hey Steve, why don't you post your location log for everybody to see? It's harmless, right??

macs

This was not as bad as the iPhone 4 antenna problem. Whats the point of a 9.9 mm device if u have to stick it in a case to get good reception. What you fail to realise is Apple are selling a status symbol not just a smartphone. The same way some people buy designer labels they buy iphones. Apple can release the same device 6 months later in white they go nuts for it.

brian_g

What you (and many of the posters here) fail to realize is that Apple is selling much more than just a "status symbol." You don't see the high customer satisfaction numbers or repeat business with a product that is all style and no substance unless it is purely a fashion accessory (do these jeans make my butt look fat?) and phones are far from a fashion accessory. This is why the WP7 team needs to start hitting on all cylinders or they risk being another Palm in the mobile OS world.

macs

Many iPhone users are satisfied with the iPhone because it is a status symbol otherwise the clear discontent about the antenna problems and now this location thing would impact those satisfaction figures. I know people who have spent £602 just to change their already owned iPhone 4 to a white version.

macs

This is wishful thinking and somewhat delusional.

Nokia is popular in low cost and low infrastructure countries like China and India because they are low cost. Nokia usually have lower cost hardware to keep costs down in these emerging markets. The other reason many keep with Nokia is because of Symbians simplicity and they know it inside out, this may open up these markets to low cost Android devices (under $100) rather than changing to higher cost WP7. For WP7 to make inwards in these markets they need to produce a low cost device (<$100) and with min hardware specs that's just not possible for now.

Of course there are more developed Asian countries like South Korea and Japan and brands like Samsung, LG and Sony are king here. The Galaxy S II sold 120,000 units in South Korea in 72 hours.

What Microsoft need to do is speed up hardware certification otherwise devices will always be behind other platforms specification wise. They need to produce a low cost range obviously with lower spec. They need to build themselves or in partnership with someone else a Nexus one type device. It needs to be the dogs bullocks and needs to be guaranteed of all updates within days of release.

They need to embrace the modding community. It was the driving force behind WM and most of them shifted to Android because its now the only mod-able platform. Its simple modding your device means you lose warranty and Microsoft support but if the community is strong you will get that from the modding community. When surveying the Android community Motorola where told the most request featured was an unlocked boot loader. Others like LG and Samsung are embracing modding their devices.
Bartender64

Sometimes I wonder why this site its called wmpoweruser, the hate on this site c
For WP its getting worst than Engadget sad.
OpenThread

Afraid you're wrong on 2 counts: certainly in the UK and the US, there are more deals to get "2 for 1" than not, and they are being given away on some contracts on the UK. People in the developing world buy on price – Nokia does well in APAC, because it sells good, low priced, non-smart phones. Whether it can lower the price of it's WP7 offerings to tap in to this market is one thing, and if it does, it's margins will become further squeezed. Nokia is becoming known as the poor man's phone supplier, in the UK at least.

Hotmail Alias

The Canalys Report is about smartphones ONLY. The figures and discussion in my post is also about smartphones ONLY. I have not even touched the subject of Nokia's low priced non-smartphones. I am talking of top of the line, exorbitantly priced Symbian and Meego smartphones by Nokia which people in APAC and EMEA buy just because it is a Nokia. Thats their strength and brand recall.

I bought a DVP recently and had to go around in some small towns(in India) with very low smartphone penetration over the last fortnight. I decided to show around my device and its capabilities and see their reaction. Apart from the oohs and ahs, one of the first things they'd ask….. Is it a Blackberry? (RIM is also huge in the minds of people here, even though they think RIM phones are too hi-tech for them). Only a small fraction of people thought it could be iPhone. When I told them its better than Blackberries and iPhones and showed them the slick interface, magical(!!) apps and the Windows logo, I was generally greeted with incredulity. The next reaction almost across the board was….. when will Nokia make sets like this? Some people also claimed to have seen such a phone made by Nokia with someone they knew (Ha Ha). Others claimed it would have been even better if it were a Nokia, Nokia would have made it lighter, Nokia would have had a better camera etc etc. All in all I realised three things – one, the only brand they trust is Nokia, two, Nokia is the benchmark against which all phones are to be judged, and three (most importantly), if Nokia makes a phone it will reach all corners of the country. They somehow took it for granted that I got my device from Europe or USA and talked about waiting till Nokia makes such phones. And India is one of the fastest growing smartphone markets. Its a huge legacy for Nokia and they (and Microsoft) would have to do things really wrong to screw it up.

India is also a huge market for low end non-smartphones where local manufacturers (not Samsung or LG or Sony Ericsson) are giving Nokia a serious run for their money, but that's a story for another day.