Samsung brought the Galaxy S21 line to market earlier than they typically would a Galaxy S phone, probably because they were in desperate need of a boost in sales for their flagship S line. According to a new report out of Korea, that early launch didn’t help push numbers for the year and the S21 isn’t much of a hit, falling far below the two previous Galaxy S phones.
The Business Post is reporting that Galaxy S21 series sold roughly 13.5 million units during its first 6 months. If that sounds like a lot of phones, understand that it would be for most companies not named Samsung or Apple. But because this is a Samsung phone, that number is quite low when compared to previous Galaxy S phones.
Compared to the first 6 months of sales of the Galaxy S20, that’s a 20% drop. It gets worse when you compare it to the Galaxy S10, where that number marks a 47% drop. Clearly, the Galaxy S21 is not helping Samsung turn things around in the flagship space.
Making matters worse here, consider the fact that Samsung reduced the price of the Galaxy S21 compared to the Galaxy S20 by $200 across the board as a way to attract more customers. Of course, as we pointed out when the phones launched, Samsung had to cut quite a bit from the Galaxy S21 and Galaxy S21+ in order to get to those price points. We don’t know if the cuts factored into people’s decision to skip the phones, but I can’t imagine it helped.
In our reviews, we had high marks for the super expensive Galaxy S21 Ultra, yet found the Galaxy S21 to be lacking and not as good as the Galaxy S20 from the year before. Personally speaking, the Galaxy S20 was my favorite phone for most of 2020 and I haven’t wanted to touch the S21 since reviewing it. It was an absolute miss in my book.
Could Samsung turn things around with the Galaxy S22? It’s a tough game, selling $1,000 phones, but if anyone could do it I would bet that Samsung can find a way. However, what’s left to help you standout in this competitive market? Branding your camera with Olympus? Hah.
