Published on the 27/11/2014 | Written by Clare Coulson

In 2013 the market grew a whopping 52.5 percent according to IDC, but the firm’s newly-released numbers for 2014 show that this year it will grow only a fraction of that, slowing to just 7.2 percent year-over-year. Gartner estimates that tablet sales worldwide will reach 229 million units in 2014, representing 9.5 percent of total worldwide sales of devices in 2014. Meanwhile the mobile phone segment will continue to grow in 2014 due to strong sales of lower-end smartphones. Gartner says sales of basic smartphones (including midrange Android devices) are projected to grow 52 percent in 2014, while utility smartphone units (including low-end Chinese white box devices) will double. As smartphones reach lower prices, Gartner expects nine out of 10 phones to be smartphones by 2018.

Neither analyst firm is surprised by the slow-down in the tablet market as they have watched the lifecycle of tablets continue to lengthen. Once expected to have similar lifecycles to smartphones, tablet owners are now holding on to their devices for three or even four years. Ryan Reith, programme director with IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Device Trackers said this is further enabled due to legacy software support being available for longer, in particular for the iOS, and the increased use of smartphones for a variety of computing tasks. Apple might have cracked the $US700 billion market capitalisation barrier on the NASDAQ overnight, making it the first company ever to do so, however, this year is expected to be the first in which there is a full year of decline in Apple iPad shipments. The popularity of the iPhone is still at a high however, and the company received a nice share price bump when it announced the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in September.

Speaking in early October, when Gartner released its tablet numbers, research director Ranjit Atwal, said: “The device market continues to evolve, with the relationship between traditional PCs, different form factor ultramobiles (clamshells, hybrids and tablets) and mobile phones becoming increasingly complex.” Indeed, he said, some users are not replacing their tablet with a tablet. They are favoring hybrid or two-in-one devices, he said.

As confirmation of the trend Gartner is projecting over 90 million fewer new tablet purchasers and 155 million fewer tablet replacements through to 2018. IDC’s recent research also shows that significant advancements have been made by hardware manufacturers to advance the two-in-one, or detachable, product category. It says that devices have become thinner, prices have come down, and more models are available. Despite this however shipments of two-in-one devices are only expected to reach 8.7 million units in 2014, which is just four percent of the total combined tablet plus two-in-one market. According to IDC a large part of the reason for this is consumer hesitancy around the Windows 8 platform which most of them are built on.

As to the future, IDC says there are a few unknowns that could impact overall tablet shipments, such as the industry reaction to Windows 10, what Google does in this space with Android and Chrome OS, and Apple’s rumored product line expansion. Despite this, it seems likely that consumers will continue to hold onto tablets longer than their smartphones, it says.