Detachables the shining light for troubled tablet market

Tablet shipments decline over 11 per cent in Q1 but Google's entrance to the detachables market promises to shake things up, IDC claims

Global tablet shipments declined 11.7 per cent in Q1, but the detachables market continued to grow and is expected to keep gathering pace following Google's entrance, according to IDC.

Traditional slate tablets saw shipments decline 13.9 per cent year on year to 26.8 million units, but the detachables market - housing devices including Microsoft Surface's products and Apple's iPad Pro - saw growth of 2.9 per cent.

IDC is predicting that detachables will continue to experience shipment growth, particular after Google's first foray into the market.

Jitesh Ubrani, senior research analyst at IDC, said: "Chrome OS' entrance in the detachable market is a welcome change as Google is finally a serious contender from a platform perspective.

"Google's tighter control and integration of Chrome OS will allow brands to focus more on hardware design and additional services rather than spending resources reconfiguring Android to work in a detachable setting.

"Combined with Microsoft's efforts to run Windows on ARM, the detachable market is poised for strong growth in the near term."

Apple retained its position as the tablet market's number one player, cornering over a quarter of the market in Q1.

Samsung remained in second place with a share of 16.7 per cent, followed by Huawei and Lenovo.

Amazon saw the greatest market share decline, down from 5.8 per cent in Q1 2017 to 3.5 per cent this year.

Worldwide tablet shipments (in millions)