Research firm IDC says shipments for the first quarter of 2017 were 36.2 million, down 8.5 percent from the same period last year. Shipments in the first quarter peaked in 2014, when 50.4 million tablets were shipped worldwide.
IDC includes traditional tablets and more powerful devices, such as the Surface Pro, in its tablet sales count - any tablet with remarkable first-party keyboard features, but convertible laptops with permanently connected keyboards do not.
Apple remains the market leader, with just under a quarter of all shipments by IDC calculations. But its control over the market contracted slightly, suggesting that the iPad Pro has not done much to improve sales. In fact, the only major tablet maker that grew this quarter was Huawei, which was up to 2.7 million shipments, from just 2 million at the same time last year.
The next few months could be interesting to watch. Apple's tablet line got more aggressive in late March with the launch of a $ 329 iPad, one of the lowest prices Apple has put on a tablet to date. But it was sent too late to have an impact on results this quarter.
IDC also says it looks for what Apple and Microsoft have planned for later in the year, saying that the market "will move with major product launches" of the two.
That said, the Microsoft Surface line does not seem to have a big impact. Microsoft is not on the IDC list of the top five tablet makers, which may be because it focuses on high-end, expensive devices. Amazon ranks third in market share and focuses entirely on low-cost tablets.
IDC analyst Ryan Reith sees a couple of reasons why people do not buy as many tablets these days. "We continue to believe that the main driver for this was the increased reliance on smartphones, coupled with minimal technology and form factor progression," says Reith.
For now, IDC says tablet market growth is in "detachables" - that is, tablets like the iPad Pro with removable keyboards. Shipments of these devices continue to grow, and IDC thinks they will continue to knock out convertible laptops in the long run. However, this quarter, that did not happen completely.
