Samsung was the undisputed foldable king in the third quarter of this year, reports Smart Analytics Global (SAG) based on data from its Smartphone 360 research service. Overall, the foldable market shrank 2% year-over-year to 7.5 million units shipped for the three-month period.
Samsung held 69% market share, its highest since 2023. Meanwhile, Huawei lost 4 percentage points, but remains in second place. Lenovo/Motorola gained 2 percentage points as it rolled out the Razr 70 series to new regions. As for other brands, their market share declined significantly.
Samsung’s success is attributed to the Galaxy Z Fold8, which amounted to over half of Samsung’s global shipments for the quarter. It also helped Samsung achieve “double-digit” growth of foldable shipments in Europe and South Korea.
Global foldable smartphone shipments in Q3 2026 (Source)
According to Ice Universe, Samsung has shipped approximately 2.85 million Z Fold8 units in the 55 days between its launch on August 7 and the end of the quarter on September 30. That would mean that the wide foldable accounted for 55% of Samsung’s total foldable shipments and works out to over 50,000 units shipped per day.
It must be noted that Q3 is before the iPhone Duo started shipping on October 23, so it’s not on the chart. SAG has revised down its estimate for the full 2026, in part because of Apple’s production woes with the Duo. It’s not just that, though – demand for foldables in China is lower than expected. That will hurt Apple as China is one of its biggest markets.
This is also a major reason for Huawei’s drop – China is the company’s primary market (it does have a limited presence on the global stage, but not like it did before). Here’s something interesting – the odd-looking, non-folding Huawei Pura X View has cannibalized sales of the Pura X and Pura X Max, which kicked off the wide foldable craze.
There’s good news for 2027 – SAG estimates that the global foldable market will grow by 55% year-over-year. And Apple will capture an impressive 40% of the market, once it gets its iPhone Duo production line in order. It, as well as the Galaxy Z Fold8 and other wide foldables, is expected to account for two-thirds of the foldable market next year.