Throughout last year, Russians were actively buying used and discounted smartphones, Kommersant reported, citing data from telecom operators, marketplaces, retailers and secondary trading platforms.. According to Avito, in just one year, about 9 million such devices were sold in the country, and mostly used smartphones from Apple and Samsung were purchased.
In the MTS network, sales of discounted smartphones doubled in physical terms and 2.5 times in monetary terms. According to an MTS representative, the most popular models were the iPhone 11 and iPhone 12. MegaFon noted the same trend, and in monetary terms, sales of used smartphones increased fourfold, and in quantitative terms – by 149%. Of the brands, Samsung was the most popular.
“65% of orders in the “discount” category are Apple mobile phones, the remaining sales come from Samsung and other brands,” reported Yandex Market.
According to experts, the growth in demand for used smartphones was facilitated by rising prices for new ones and problems with their supply and maintenance.. In this regard, Russians now prefer new smartphones from Chinese vendors, noted TelecomDaily CEO Denis Kuskov. “But sales of used Apple and Samsung devices are gradually growing: the cost of a used smartphone is several times lower than the price of a new gadget, and the consumer still wants to buy a device from these vendors,” he says.
Kommersant also noted that large electronics networks such as M.Video, Citylink or re:Store do not have iPhone 12 Pro and 13 Pro smartphones in stock, and those offered, for example on marketplaces, cost not much cheaper than the new smartphone of the latest model iPhone 15 Pro. For example, on Yandex Market, an iPhone 12 Pro with 512 GB costs 166 thousand. rubles, and at M.Video a new iPhone 15 Pro with 512 GB can be bought for 177–190 thousand. rub.
The absence of the iPhone Pro 12th, 13th and 14th series of smartphones in the Citylink assortment was explained by the official discontinuation of these devices by Apple. Pavel Rabotenko, head of the Telecom Mobile CL procurement group at Citylink, told Kommersant that online demand for Apple smartphones in October-December increased sequentially by 62% in physical terms and by 71% in monetary terms.