Emerging markets worldwide have accounted for the growth of smartphones in the third quarter of this year, growing by 20 percent.
Gartner said Samsung lost market share, but Chinese manufacturers are showing positive growth.
Altogether, sales of smartphones accounted for 301 million units shipping in the third quarter.
Roberta Cozza, research director at Gartner, said in the third quarter smartphones represented 66 percent of the total mobile phone market. She thinks that by 2018 nine out of 10 phones will be smartphones.
Western Europe saw a decline in growth of 5.2 percent, but the USA saw high growth of 18.9 percent, fuelled by the launch of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus.
In terms of market share, Samsung holds 24.4 percent of the market, Apple holds 12.7, Huawei holds 5.3 percent, Xiaomi has 5.2 percent of the market and Lenovo five percent.
As far as operating systems are concerned, Android ruled the roost in the third quarter (83.1%), Apple was next with 12.7 percent, Windows only held three percent and Blackberry 0.8 percent.
Cozza said: “The smartphone market is more than ever in flux as more players step up their game in this space. With the ability to undercut cost and offer top specs, Chinese brands are well positioned to expand in the premium phone market too.”
