Easing Covid-19 (coronavirus) restrictions did little to boost the global smartphone market in Q3, which Gartner stated declined 5.7 per cent year-on-year, though the company noted some bright spots in key countries.

The company placed sales to end users at 366 million, which senior research director Anshul Gupta said was due to consumers continuing to limit “their discretionary spend” despite the easing of lockdowns in many nations.

Gartner noted non-essential spending patterns remained affected by economic uncertainties and worries about subsequent waves of the pandemic. But it also flagged delays in 5G network deployments as a hindrance for device vendors.

Gupta said the company found “early signs of recovery” in some countries, with sales in India up 9.3 per cent in India, 8.5 per cent in Indonesia and 3.3 per cent in Brazil.

“Near normal conditions in China improved smartphone production”, Gupta stated, explaining this “benefitted sales to some extent”.

Samsung and Xiaomi were the only top five smartphone vendors to increase sales, up 2.2 per cent to 80.8 million units and 34.9 per cent to 44.4 million respectively.

Huawei sales fell 21.3 per cent to 51.8 million units; Apple remained flat on 40.5 million; with Oppo on 29.8 million units, down 2.3 per cent.