Over the past year, we've seen the best smartphone makers embrace AI in a big way. Samsung and Google marketed the Galaxy S24 and Pixel 8, respectively, with a huge focus on buzzworthy AI upgrades, and Apple's take on generative AI with Apple Intelligence is expected to make waves this fall with the iPhone 16 series. Smartphones are driving the AI revolution into our lives, and experts predict it will only ramp up from here.
A Friday forecast from the IDC, a consumer data research firm, estimates that Gen AI smartphone shipments will reach 234 million units by the end of the year — a year-over-year growth of 364%. For reference, IDC defines Gen AI smartphones as devices with a system-on-a-chip (SoC) capable of running on-device generative AI models that leverage a neural processing unit that meets certain benchmarks. Some chipsets it lists that meet this standard are the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 found on the world's best Android phones and the iPhone 15 Pro's Apple A17 Pro processor.
