The global chip shortage notwithstanding, notebook PCs had yet another great quarter with 8 percent year-on-year (YoY) growth. Demand for premium products and consumer spending also recorded an increase thanks to discounts on the MacBook Air and gaming-centric notebooks.

According to a new report by Strategy Analytics, Apple was the fourth highest-selling notebook PC vendor in the third quarter of this year while Lenovo ranked first. The MacBook maker raked in 6.5 million unit sales with a 10 percent market share and YoY growth. Chart-topper Lenovo sold a whopping 15.3 million units and commanded a 23 percent market share although its YoY growth stood at a dismal 5 percent.

Apple’s M1-powered MacBooks and Macs offer superior performance and battery life than competing Windows laptops wrapped in a slimmer form factor. It’s no surprise that there has been a steady increase in the demand for new Macs with every passing quarter. Meanwhile, for Lenovo, this is the fourth consecutive quarter where it demonstrated chart-topping business performance. HP notebooks were the second-highest selling by volume despite a five percent drop in YoY sale volume. Dell recorded a stellar 50 percent YoY growth, the highest in the segment.

In its Q3 earnings report, Apple posted $81.4 billion in revenue. The report said that the revenue from Mac and iPad sales continued to climb thanks to the transition to remote work and remote learning. Macs performed 1.25x better than Q3 last year and recorded an impressive $2.3 billion YoY increase in revenue.

Industry analyst Chirag Upadhyay said

“The commercial customers’ upgrade kicked in as some employees returned to in-person work with the target to improve productivity. Education demand (including consumer) was better in the developed market as back to university discounts gave consumers a good reason to upgrade now rather than later. It’s worth noting that the shortage of components and rising prices for manufacturing and freight costs also delayed some orders for many vendors. In other words, shipments could have been even higher.”

Strategy Analytics’ director of connected computing Eric Smith added

“The education demand slowed down in the US as most schools reopened for in-person learning and other spending took priority over computer purchases. A few vendors already had orders canceled or delayed until the new budget becomes available for computing devices again.”

Put together, all the manufacturers sold 66.8 million notebooks in the third quarter and Chromebooks witnessed a noticeable slowdown. However, we believe that Mac sales won’t grow as rapidly as Apple would have hoped during the ongoing quarter due to the global chip shortage showing no signs of abating.