iPhone users are notably devoted to Apple, with few making the switch to other handset makers when they upgrade. But now Samsung users are catching up in terms of brand loyalty.
Roughly three out of four existing iPhone users in the U.S., U.K, and Australia who upgraded last year chose to upgrade to another iPhone, according to new survey results from WDS, compiled by BI Intelligence.
But Samsung users aren't far off.
About 58% of Samsung users who upgraded chose a new Samsung device in 2013.
Little surprise, BlackBerry users were the most disloyal. Roughly four out of every five upgrading BlackBerry owners chose to upgrade to a different brand when picking a new handset.
The BI Intelligence chart at the bottom of the post shows the retention rates at each of the major phone manufacturers.
It's important to remember that the 3,000 customers WDS surveyed are from three of the most developed mobile markets in the world, where Apple has always been the dominant smartphone maker.
The walled-off iOS platform is good at keeping users within its ecosystem; it's always been much more likely that an Android user would switch from a Samsung Galaxy S4 to an HTC One than that an iPhone user would switch to Samsung.
This is why BI Intelligence highlighted Samsung's impressive 58% retention rate. It means that many mobile users in the developed world now find Samsung's mobile experience so good that they do no think of switching vendors.
And on top of that, Samsung was also the top choice across the board for all consumers who switched brands, acquiring 34% of customers who switched.
BII