Tablets See 8.5% Global Shipping Decline

The party may be over for the tablet market.

According to the latest research from market intelligence firm International Data Corporation (IDC), Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker, the global tablet market has seen an 8.5 percent year-over-year decline from Q1 2016 to this year. With this data insight, it marks the tenth straight quarter of shipping declines for the tablet market.

In particular, IDC is seeing the decline occur in traditional slate tablets. The tablets that have detachable keyboards and more closely resemble laptops have not seen the same rate of decline and have in fact seen a steady growth. As such, it should come as no surprise that IDC is predicting detachables will continue their upward trajectory and factor into major 2017 new product launches for the likes of Microsoft and Apple.

IDC’s program vice president for its Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Device Trackers, Ryan Reith, commented on the tablet market overall and how consumers play a role in its success. He said “As far as most are aware, the tablet market as created in 2010 with the launch of the original iPad, despite unsuccessful product attempts by other OEMs in the years leading up to this. The rate at which the tablet market grew from 2010 to 2013 was unlike many other consumer-oriented device markets we’ve seen before. However, it appears for many reasons consumers became less eager to refresh these devices, or in some instances purchase them at all. We continue to believe the leading driver for this was the increased dependency on smartphones, along with rather minimal technology and form factor progression.”