UAE Phone Market Tops $3.5 Billion, Smartphones and 5G Lead the Way

The mobile phone market in the UAE is experiencing balanced growth in 2025. Total shipments have climbed to about 6.99 million devices, valued at 11.21 billion dirhams ($3.53 billion), according to data from IDC, a firm specializing in telecommunications and IT research. This shows that demand for smart devices in the local market remains strong. The UAE has secured a significant share of the phone market within the GCC countries, accounting for about 27% of the total 25.96 million devices shipped. This highlights the UAE's position as a key regional hub for trading and distributing smartphones. Smartphones continue to completely dominate the UAE market, making up 92.2% of total shipments with 6.44 million devices, compared to just 7.8% for traditional phones. This clearly indicates a rapid shift towards digital usage and consumers embracing advanced technologies. This trend also reflects the higher average price of a smartphone in the UAE market, reaching 1739 dirhams, compared to just 77 dirhams for traditional devices. This suggests that consumers are leaning towards higher-end models with more advanced technical capabilities and specifications. The data also showed a growing reliance on 5G technology. Phones supporting 5G accounted for 59.1% of total phone sales in the Gulf region during 2025. This growth is driven by improvements in telecommunications infrastructure and increased demand for faster connection speeds. Globally, the smartphone market saw modest growth of 1.5% during the year, with Apple showing strong performance, shipping about 247.4 million devices, an annual growth of 6.1%. Despite this growth, forecasts suggest a slight decline in shipments for 2026, by 1%. This is due to challenges related to a shortage of memory components, which could lead to higher average selling prices globally and reshape the supply and demand dynamics in the smartphone market in the coming period.