The iPhone XR was the world’s most popular smartphone last year after shifting more than 46.3m units, according to new statistics published by Omdia.
The annual ‘Smartphone Model Market Tracker’ showed that Apple’s premium mid-range device, which went on sale in late 2018, outsold the next best smartphone by 6m units.
The good news for Apple is that it also secured second place on the list as the iPhone 11, only on sale for the final three months of 2019, shipped 37.3m units.
Samsung is Apple’s main competitor in the flagship arena, but not a single S10 series smartphone made the top 10 list.
The South Korean company did round out the top five with three of its phones, but all were mid to low-range offerings.
The Galaxy A10 sold the most for Samsung with 30.3m units, while the Galaxy A50 and Galaxy A20 came in with 24.2m and 19.2m shipments, respectively.
Apple had two more placings in the top 10 – the iPhone 11 Pro Max was in sixth with 17.6m and the iPhone 8 was in seventh with 17.4m.
The iPhone 8 was the most popular smartphone in 2018 with 31.5m shipments.
The final spots in the standings for 2019 were filled by Xiaomi and its Redmi Note 7 (16.4) and Samsung Galaxy J2 Core (15.2m).
Omdia executive Jusy Hong said that Apple has now secured the first and second positions in global shipment rankings for five successive years.
Hong added: “By limiting the number of models it offers compared to its top competitors, Apple has been able to concentrate its sales on a few smartphones that have broad appeal, like the iPhone XR.”
However, the report did find that Apple’s overall shipments declined for the second year and by 4.6% in 2019.