This research group says Mac sales dropped 34.2%, not 46%, year-over-year

Yesterday the Canalys research group released data that showed Mac sales dipped 46% year-over-year in the first quarter of 2023. However, a new report from the Garner research group says the sales dip was a still-bad-but-not-as-bad 34.2%.

Worldwide personal computer (PC) shipments totaled 55.2 million units in the first quarter of 2023, a 30% decrease from the first quarter of 2022, according to preliminary results by Gartner. The research group says that an unfavorable combination of oversupply and continued low PC demand due to economic uncertainties and a lack of purchase motivation led to the second consecutive quarter of historic year-over-year decline.

Gartner says Apple sold approximately 4.8 million Macs in the first quarter of 2023 for 8.7% of the global PC market (the research group doesn’t count tablets such as iPads as PCs). That compares to sales of 9.3 million Macs and 9.3% market share in the first quarter of 2022.

That 34.2% drop is bad, but isn’t much worse than the other top 5 global PC makers (Apple ranks fourth). Year-over-year saw first place Lenovo’s sales drop 30.2%, giving it 23.3% of the global market share.

Year-over-year saw second place HP’s sales drop 24.4%, giving it 21.8% of the global market share. Year-over-year saw third place Dell’s sales drop 30.9%, giving it 17.3% of the global market share. And year-over-year saw fifth place’s ASUS’s sales drop 30%, giving it 7.1% of the global market share.