How loyal are iPhone and Android users?
The fact that a manufacturer sells a lot of smartphones in a given period is not enough in itself. Real success is when customers are so satisfied that they stick to the brand in the future.
Once someone buys an iPhone, they will most likely stick with the Apple brand – this was revealed, and not for the first time, in a recent survey by CIRP (Consumer Intelligence Research Partners).
According to CIRP data, Apple’s so-called loyalty rate, i.e., the percentage of customers who buy an iPhone and who also had an iPhone as their previous smartphone, is stable at 90 percent – and this has been the case for the past three years. However, brand loyalty from android manufacturers is probably not as high because it is easier to change brands within the Android ecosystem.
Overall loyalty of Android users is also about 90 percent.
It’s always been hard for Apple to steal Android customers (and vice versa), and that trend doesn’t seem to have changed this year either.
Android smartphones have the highest loyalty to Samsung, with about two-thirds of South Korean manufacturers buying handsets just before having another Samsung phone. Samsung has therefore retained its users. However, the commitment to Motorola and LG handsets has been on a declining trend since the year ending September 2019.
The CIRP report also reveals that the iPhone has accounted for 43 percent of U.S. smartphone sales in the past three years. Samsung, in second place, can claim 31 percent of sales.
