Tablet Shipments Fell 14.7% In Q1, Amazon Sees Market Growth Of More Than 5000%

IDC said in a report on Friday worldwide shipments of tablets fell 14.7 percent in the first quarter due to the seasonality of the market and an "overall disinterested customer base."

According to IDC, worldwide shipments of tablets totaled 39.6 million units in the quarter while slate tablets accounted for 87.6 percent of all shipments.

Total shipments of slate tablets continued to decline in the quarter but detachable tablets realized a triple digit year-over-year growth on shipments.

"Microsoft arguably created the market for detachable tablets with the launch of their Surface line of products," said Jitesh Ubrani, senior research analyst with IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Device Trackers. "With the PC industry in decline, the detachable market stands to benefit as consumers and enterprises seek to replace their aging PCs with detachables. Apple's recent foray into this segment has garnered them an impressive lead in the short term, although continued long-term success may prove challenging as a higher entry price point staves off consumers and iOS has yet to prove its enterprise-readiness, leaving plenty of room for Microsoft and their hardware partners to reestablish themselves."

Market Leaders:

Apple Inc. AAPL held on to the No. 1 spot with a 25.9 percent market share at the end of the quarter on 10.3 million units shipped. However, this marks a decrease from a 27.2 percent market share in the same period a year ago on total shipments of 12.6 million units.

Samsung's market share also fell to 15.2 percent from 18.0 percent a year ago.

Perhaps surprising to some, Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN captured a 5.7 percent market share in the quarter, up from just 0.1 percent a year ago. Granted, Amazon's market share gain is "astronomical," it's important to consider that Amazon's tablet lineup a year ago featured a 6-inch tablet which wasn't counted by IDC as it didn't meet the requirements of its taxonomy.

China-based Lenovo and Huawei captured a 5.5 percent market share (versus 5.4 percent a year ago) and 5.2 percent (versus 2.4 percent) a year ago, respectively.