The iPhone 5S is now the most popular mobile phone in the UAE, according to Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA).
The smartphone accounted for 3.7 percent of all handsets registered on the two UAE networks, Etisalat and Du, in the third quarter of 2014.
The TRA said some 59 percent of handsets registered in the period were smartphones.
Most popular phones in the UAE in Q3 2014
- iPhone 5S 3.7%
- iPhone 5 2.5%
- Samsung Galaxy SIII 2.4%
- iPhone 4S 1.7%
- Samsung Galaxy S4 LTE 1.7%
- Samsung Galaxy S Duos 1.5%
- iPhone 4 1.4%
- Samsung Note 3 1.2%
- Blackberry Bold 9900 1.2%
- Samsung Galaxy S5 0.7%
[Compare UAE mobile phone plans by provider and by handset]
Obviously this will change with popular new phones such as the iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, the Samsung Galaxy Note 4, the LG G3 and the HTC One M8.
Of the entire handset base in the UAE, 45 percent are Nokias – although this is declining – followed by Samsung (22.6 percent), Apple (10 percent), BlackBerry (6.1 percent), Sony (1.1 percent), HTC (1 percent), then Lenovo (0.9 percent) and Huawei (0.8 percent). Although the growth has shrunk, Samsung and Apple recorded increases in their market shares in third quarter.