Global shipments of “phablets” – smartphones with screens of 5-inches or more – are expected to more than double this year, as more vendors begin offering devices in this category, according to IHS iSuppli.

At 2013 CES earlier this month, new devices falling into this category were announced by Huawei and ZTE, joining Samsung’s market-leading Note line.

According to the research firm, shipments are expected to reach 60.4 million units in 2013, up 136 percent from 25.6 million in 2012. It was noted that the Chinese vendors are leading the way, although Sony Mobile’s flagship Xperia Z also has a 5-inch screen.

The company noted that the devices with 5-inch, 1920×1080 pixel screens have a higher pixel-per-inch rating (443 ppi) than Apple’s retina iPhone 5 (326 ppi) and the Galaxy Note II (267 ppi). Devices launched recently with this resolution included Huawei’s Ascend D2 and ZTE’s Grand S.

New features introduced by the latest devices include water-spill resistance and shatter-resistant screens.

DigiTimes noted that phablets are set to be dominated by Android devices, because of the lack of support for suitable resolution screens in platforms such as Windows Phone, BlackBerry 10 and iOS.

While these platforms are able to support high-quality displays on screen sizes in the 4-inch to 5-inch range, higher resolutions are needed on devices where the screen is larger in order to maintain pixel-per-inch levels.