Feb 26 (Reuters) - The global smartphone market is

poised to suffer its biggest decline ever in 2026, sinking to a

more than decade low in shipments, as surging memory chip prices

drive up device costs, the International Data Corporation said

on Thursday.

Smartphone shipments are expected to drop 12.9% to 1.12

billion units, the research firm said in a report.

The decline will hit low-end Android manufacturers the

hardest, while Apple ( AAPL ) and Samsung are

positioned to gain market share as smaller rivals struggle or

exit the market entirely, the report said.

"What we are witnessing is not a temporary squeeze, but a

tsunami-like shock originating in the memory supply chain," said

Francisco Jeronimo, vice president for Worldwide Client Devices

at IDC.

Analysts have said rising component costs will erode margins

at smartphone companies focused on budget devices, forcing them

to pass on the expenses to consumers at a time when demand at

higher price points is weakening.

Apple ( AAPL ) and Samsung, with stronger balance sheets and premium

positioning, are better equipped to weather the crisis, IDC

said.

The average selling price of smartphones is projected to

surge 14% to a record $523 this year, as manufacturers shift

toward higher-margin models to offset ballooning costs.

IDC expects a modest 2% recovery in 2027 as the crisis

eases, followed by a 5.2% rebound in 2028, though it said that

the market was unlikely to return to previous norms.

"The memory crisis will cause more than a temporary decline;

it marks a structural reset of the entire market," said Nabila

Popal, senior research director at IDC's Mobile Phone Tracker.

She warned that the sub-$100 smartphone segment,

representing 171 million devices, will become "permanently

uneconomical" even after memory prices stabilize by mid-2027.

(Reporting by Kritika Lamba in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini

Ganguli)