After years during which the first two positions remained unchanged, in 2022 there was an important change in the ranking of the world’s largest Smart TV manufacturers: the Chinese company TCL has, by a narrow margin, displaced the Korean company LG from the second position on the podium.
And that’s not the only news, because it’s also worth noting that other Chinese manufacturers have risen in the rankings, occupying the fourth and fifth positions. Among the top five global Smart TV manufacturers, therefore, 3 are Chinese, and the other two are Korean. However, a closer look at the numbers reveals that the Koreans still maintain their leadership.
Smart TV
Manufacturer Rankings According to the market analysis company Omdia, Samsung firmly holds the first position among Smart TV manufacturers, with 19.6% of the entire market share, meaning almost one out of every 5 Smart TVs is produced by Samsung.
The Korean giant has maintained this top position for a solid 17 years. In second place, with 11.7% of the market share, is TCL, which surpasses the other Korean company, LG (11.69%), by just 30,000 units sold in 2022. Following in third place is the second Chinese company, Hisense, with 10.5%, and then the third Chinese company, Xiaomi, with 6.2%.
Consequently, here is the top 5 list of Smart TV manufacturers in 2022:
- Samsung: 19.6%
- TCL: 11.7%
- LG: 11.69%
- Hisense: 10.5%
- Xiaomi: 6.2% Clearly, we can see the rise of Chinese manufacturers whose Smart TVs are becoming more and more prevalent in our homes. TCL and Hisense, in particular, have been experiencing strong growth for years, so these percentages should not come as much of a surprise. However, things change when we look at the market share value held by each of these manufacturers.
Which Companies Are Worth More One thing is to look at how much a manufacturer sells, and another is to analyze what they sell. As we well know, not all Smart TVs are the same, and they don’t all have the same price.
In fact, Samsung and LG remain firmly in the lead in terms of market value due to their production and sale of high-end models, while TCL, Hisense, and Xiaomi are better positioned in the lower-end market segment.
The ranking
Things are, however, changing, and by the end of 2023, the ranking of Smart TV manufacturers with the highest market value could change. TCL, for example, already has several models with Mini LED screens in its lineup (such as the C93, C83, C82, and X10 series), while Hisense has both Mini LED models (U9GQ and U8HQ series) and even OLED models (A85H, A9G, A8G, A9H).
The Other Battle: Operating Systems Finally, an analysis within the analysis: Smart TV manufacturers don’t just make money by selling their models but also by selling their Smart TV operating systems. These operating systems enable the collection of data on viewers’ habits, which are then sold in anonymous form to third-party companies.
For example, Samsung develops Tizen OS and sells it to other manufacturers. LG also develops WebOS and sells it to third-party manufacturers.
TCL, on the other hand, over the years has used operating systems developed by others: Roku OS, Fire TV OS, and finally, Android TV (with or without the Google TV interface). Hisense, like Samsung and LG, has developed its in-house operating system called Vidaa OS and sells it to other manufacturers such as Toshiba, Loewe, Newsan, BGH, Element, Schneider, Nordmende, Shinon, Vortex, AKAI, NIKAI, BRUHM, General Gold.
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