Samsung’s global smartwatch market position is not good

In the Wear OS smartwatch market, Samsung offers one of the best wearables overall, such as the Galaxy Watch 7 and the Galaxy Watch Ultra, making it the leader in the segment. However, when it comes to wrist-worn smart devices in general, the South Korean tech giant is far from being the leader.

International Data Corporation (IDC) has published a report analysing global wrist-worn device shipments in Q1 2025. According to it, Samsung has shipped 3.4 million units of Galaxy smart bands and smartwatches, giving it a 7.5% market share and a disappointing fourth position on the leaderboard.

What’s even more disappointing is that the South Korean tech giant’s sales have dropped from the same time last year (Q1 2024), where it shipped 3.6 million wrist-worn smart devices and had an 8.8% market share.

Samsung’s biggest rival in the smartwatch market, Apple, shipped 7 million units of Apple Watches, which gave it a 15.5% market share. Unlike Samsung, Apple’s sales increased year-over-year by 37.2 percentage points.

In the first and second positions are Huawei and Xiaomi with 10 million and 8.7 million unit sales and 21.9% and 19% market share, respectively.  What’s even more impressive is that they have witnessed 42 percentage points YoY growth.

Samsung is expected to launch its next set of smartwatches, which may have two models, the Galaxy Watch 8 and the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2, on 9 July 2025. Hopefully, these wearables will help the brand climb the leaderboard.