Samsung apparently had a pretty rough holiday quarter when it comes to shipping TVs. According to Counterpoint, which just released its market share report for TV brands for 2025.
In the graph below, you can see TCL shipments compared to Samsung shipments throughout the year. And you can see that Samsung took a pretty big nose-dive in October, which carried on through the end of the year. While TCL kept climbing.
So what happened? Well, TCL has been very aggressive with selling lower-end and mid-range TVs, which helps boost their shipment numbers. But they also had some really incredible deals on some of its more high-end TVs like the QM8K and QM9K throughout the holiday season. They also debuted the TCL T7 series, which was cheaper (MSRP around $500 for a 55″) which also got discounted pretty quickly to some insane prices.
This resulted in TCL taking the lead over Samsung for the entire year, at 16% over Samsung’s 13%. Both companies gained a percent of shipments last year, compared to 2024. Going from 12% and 15% to 13% and 16%, respectively. Counterpoint does say that Samsung still outpaced TCL in the fourth quarter, though it doesn’t really look like it in this graph.
The only TV brand in the top 5 to shrink, was Hisense
Interestingly enough, from this data from Counterpoint, we can see that only one TV maker shrunk last year. At least as far as shipments go, and that was Hisense. Which lost 3% percentage points, going down to 12%, but still enough to remain at number three.
While LG saw a marginal growth to 8% and Walmart saw a pretty big jump to 5%. Yes, Walmart sells enough onn. TVs to take up 5% of the market. Keep in mind that Walmart does also own Vizio, but that’s not included in these shipments.
Counterpoint says that Hisense saw its shipments decline about 23% year-over-year, but remained number one in China. This does show that Hisense struggled to overcome the market slump, as TVs as a whole shipped about 18% fewer units in 2025 versus 2024.
What happens when the Sony-TCL deal goes through?
Sony and TCL have announced that they are sort of merging. Basically, TCL will take a controlling stake in Sony’s TV brand, BRAVIA. Owning about 51% of that brand, which does not even show up on Counterpoint’s list here. This deal is not expected to be finalized until March 2026, and will likely hit some regulatory hurdles.
According to Counterpoint’s Research Director, Bob O’Brien, “if TCL were to gradually strengthen its presence in the premium segment through its alliance with Sony, it could pose a greater competitive threat to Samsung going forward.”
Keep in mind that right now, TCL mostly owns the low-end and mid-range segments of TVs. As well as the ultra-large screen sizes (we’re talking over 100 inches). Samsung pretty much owns the premium segment with its 8K and OLED TV options. If TCL leverages Sony to compete in that premium space, Samsung could have a problem on its hands.
The post TCL Beat Samsung In 2025 TV Shipments, Before the Sony Deal appeared first on Android Headlines.
