Chromebook oversold Macs in 2020: Report

The report says that in the first quarter of the year, macOS captured 5.8% of the market share, while Chrome OS captured 5.3% of the market share.

Chromebook (Pixabay)

The year 2020 was the first when ChromeOS-based laptops overtook Macs as far as the sales are concerned.

The competition for market dominion between ChromeOS-powered computers and Macs is old. And many-a-times Chromebooks have oversold Macs in individual quarters. But new data by IDC (via GeekWire) shows that the year 2020 was the first year when Chromebooks consistently oversold Macs for a year even as Microsoft Windows retained its top position in the market.

The report says that in the first quarter of the year, macOS captured 5.8% of the market share, while Chrome OS captured 5.3% of the market share. Windows, on the other hand, captured 87.5% of the market share. However, these numbers changed in Q2 2020 wherein Windows's share fell to 81.7%, while macOS' share grew to 7.6%, and ChromeOS's market share jumped to 10.0%.

This trend continued in the third and fourth quarter of 2020. Windows's market share dropped to 78.9% in Q3 and then to 76.7% in Q4. On the other hand, the market share of macOS grew to 8.4% in Q3 but fell back to 7.7% in Q4 2020. In the case of ChromeOS, the numbers jumped to 11.5% in Q3 and then to 14.4% in Q4 2020.

Needless to say that 2020 helped Google's Chromebook solidify its place in the market. While Windows remained the majority shareholder, ChromeOS and MacOS continued to eat into its market share.