iPhone 6 Plus has dominated US phablet sales since its launch

December 4, 2014

A new report from the research firm Kantar World Panel claims that sales of Apple's 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus have already claimed 41% of all "phablet" device sales in the US, in the three months it monitored from August to October 2014. The smartphone first went on sale on September 19, or halfway through Kantar's recording period.

Kantar considers smartphones to be in the "phablet" catagory if they have displays of 5.5 inches or higher. It added that phablet sales as a whole took up 10% of all US smartphone sales from August to October, compared to just 2% from the same period a year ago. Kantar added:

At the point of sale, when asked what drove their choice of smartphones, 58% of those surveyed who bought an iPhone 6 Plus said screen size was the primary reason for choosing their device. Despite the more compact design of the iPhone 6, 60% of consumers who chose it also cited screen size as the primary purchase driver.

Sales of the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 took up 33% of all iOS device sales in the US, according to Kantar's numbers, while the iPhone 6 Plus claimed 10 percent of that share. The older iPhone 5s was the second best selling iOS product with 26%, followed by the iPhone 5c with 18%.

Source: Kantar World Panel