Report: Less than 10% of Americans Are Buying Flagship ($1,000+) Smartphones

[Tsing]

Based on marketing and media coverage, $1,000 smartphones are must-have, ultra-popular luxuries that everyone is picking up, but the reality is quite different. According to a recent NPD report, barely 10 percent of American smartphone users are buying expensive flagships, such as the iPhone 11 Pro and Samsung Galaxy Note10. One potential reasoning/excuse is that everyone is holding out for 5G models.

…geographic disparity could partially explain why flagship phones get significantly more media coverage than other phones; most media professionals are in cities like that. However, shortage of media coverage on these lower-market phones isn't that surprising to begin with; there's not much interesting for press or influencers to say about phones that use two- or three-year-old technologies and work just well enough for most people's needs but don't make any waves or innovations.

 

[Riccochet]

Best to hold out for second gen 5G phones. Since they always seem to make considerable improvements to the second gen for better speeds.

And we're still a few years out from 5G being available in enough areas to make it worth getting.

 

[Uvilla]

Definitely sencond gen 5g... And screw 1000$ phones.

 

[anthrex]

32 million people still seems like a fairly decent size.

 

[DWolvin]

Seconded on wait for second-gen 5G. The first wave of 5G will mostly be the Qualcomm 865 using a separate chip for 4&5G. Bound to be power issues that way.

 

[Brian_B]

10% is a lot bigger market share than I would have guessed for a halo product

 

[Nanobot]

The people that are spending that much are the ones too impatient to realize that holding off a few months forces the manufacturers to cut deals in order to move product. A lot of us have figured that out so it's not surprising such a low number aren't shelling out top dollar for little innovation.

 

[JosiahBradley]

I only have a flagship phone cause I needed something with enterprise features for work and that was between whatever the latest iPhone or Galaxy was available. Otherwise I tried capping myself at 3-500$.

 

[SmokeRngs]

I still can't believe the numbers are even this high. I think it's sad that phones have gotten this expensive and people are actually buying them. I assume most of the purchases have been made through carriers at the $x per month extra on the bill for the phone because otherwise I simply don't believe the number would be anywhere near that high.

 

[Uvilla]

I don't view 10% as high, consider this is a highly advertised product.