The tablet market’s boom days may be over, with IDC reporting a 15.6 percent decline in shipments over 2016 with most of the losses occurring at the premium end. Market-watcher IDC has published figures suggesting the tablet trend may be finished, pointing to a 15.6 percent decline in sales in the past year.
Previously, consumer interest in tablets has been blamed for an ongoing — though slowing — five-year decline in sales of traditional desktop and laptop PCs, with IDC projecting that tablets would overtake traditional PC sales by 2015. Now, though, it’s the turn of tablet vendors to worry, with IDC’s latest report pointing to a whopping 15.6 percent decline in sales for 2016.
Based on the company’s preliminary figures, shipments of tablets — defined to cover both dedicated tablet devices and convertibles like the Surface family of half-tablet half-laptop portables — dropped from 207.
