The year 2023 has come to an end, and the global smartphone market has ushered in a "turning moment". It can be said that almost every mobile phone manufacturer has good news, so does this mean that the smartphone market has come out of the "cold winter period" and has begun to fully recover?
According to the report, the average replacement cycle of global smartphones in 2023 will reach a new high, reaching the "longest in history" of 51 months, that is, it will take 4 years and 3 months for a mobile phone to consider a new one. The average replacement cycle of Chinese consumers is relatively short, but it is also more than 40 months, which is equivalent to more than 3 years. What does this mean?
Consumers don't like to change mobile phones, the direct impact is the shipment of mobile phones, in the past few years, many mobile phone manufacturers are trying to solve the "nail household model", is in this regard. You know, the total shipments of the global smartphone market in 2023 will be 1.17 billion units, a decrease of 3.2% compared to the same period last year. This is also the "record low" of the global smartphone market shipments in the past 10 years, and the decline is fully revealed! There is no doubt that the smartphone market has not come out of the haze, and the "cold winter period" is still continuing!
So the question is, why don't consumers like to change their mobile phones? Personally, I think there are three main reasons, namely no money, too expensive and enough! A certain anchor has complained, "can't afford to buy 79 eyebrow pencil, you have to consider whether you work hard enough", but in fact, the current status quo is that many hard-working people, not only did not raise wages, but lowered wages, no money has become the main reason for consumers to restrain their desire to consume, you may also find that now people have gradually returned to rational consumption, non-essential do not spend!
Secondly, after the low-end mobile phone market tends to be saturated, the major mobile phone manufacturers have begun to impact the high-end mobile phone market, since it involves the word high-end, each is the rhythm of spelling configuration, stacking materials, the cost is rising, the price of mobile phones is getting more and more expensive, the starting price has reached five or six thousand, and the top price is more than 10,000 yuan, which is indeed a lot of expenses for ordinary workers, and even costs several months of wages.
According to GfK's research report, the average selling price of China's mobile phone market has reached 3480 yuan, while four years ago, this value was maintained at the level of 2685 yuan, that is, it is rising at the level of 200 yuan every year, but it is really difficult to balance compared with the stable or even falling wage level.
In addition, at present, there is a general problem of "serious homogenization" in the mobile phone market, once the new processor is released, everyone is using the same chip, rolling screen, rolling image, rolling fast charging, rolling back and forth, the difference is getting smaller and smaller, and even there is a situation of excess performance. This leads to a mobile phone that lasts for two or three years, and compared with the latest flagship configuration, there is not much gap, and the experience is not significantly different, it is completely sufficient, so there is no reason to change to a new one.
What's more, many mobile phone manufacturers will also emphasize at the new machine press conference that the mobile phone will not be stuck for 36 months or 48 months. Since the mobile phone has been so durable, there is no need to replace the new machine without breaking it, and consumers have completely lost the desire of consumers, which has led to the average replacement cycle getting longer and longer, correspondingly, the shipment of smart phones continues to decline, and the entire industry will also enter a period of recession.
Of course, this is true in any industry, and there will be such a process. If mobile phone manufacturers want to get out of the bottleneck, they must find a new direction, involution is useless, or come up with something innovative to attract consumers, otherwise, who will pay for boring mobile phones?