Omdia (IHS)

Omdia says that Color-Filter on Encapsulation (COE) will grow to be the dominant technology in foldable OLED smartphone panels, and will replace the currently-used circular polarizers. COE adoption will grow at a 33% CAGR between 2024-2030, and by 2030 almost 90% of foldable smartphones will use COE technology, and almost 20% of all smartphone OLED panels.

The adoption of COE in OLEDs increases the panel effective brightness, which means that the display consumes less power compared to a polarizer OLED (same brightness) and also lasts longer. The color gamut is also improved. On the other hand, COE OLEDs suffer from higher reflectivity compared to polarizer OLEDs. 

According to Omdia, the price of OLED microdisplays is expected to drop rapidly in the next few years, as production capacity grows, new OLED producers join the industry,  and as wafers sizes increases as well which improves production efficiency. 

Interestingly Omdia acknowledges that new technologies are set to improve the performance of OLED microdispalys - such as tandem architectures, direct emission, and more. These technologies will increase the cost of production, and it's not clear whether Omdia takes that into account in their estimates above, or whether they assume 

Omdia says that in 2028, LTPO will overtake LTPS as the leading smartphone OLED backplane technology. By 2031, smartphone LTPO OLED panel shipments will reach 520 million units, with a 52% market share (of all smartphone OLED displays).

Omdia sees the smartphone OLED market rising in the next 10 years. In 2031, over one billion OLED smartphone panels will ship. In 2024, Omdia sees a sharp increase of 24% in smartphone OLED shipments (compared to 2023), which will surpass 800 million units. 

According to Omdia, sales of OLED panels in sizes over 9-inch (the company refers to these as Large Area Displays) will increase 124.6% in 2024. In 2023, the market contracted 25.7%, with the only exception being OLED monitor panels that grew in shipments.

In 2024, Omdia says that all application areas will see an increase in shipments - TVs, monitors, tablets and laptops. Only the company's "other" category will see a decrease in sales. In particular, tablet OLED shipments are projected to increase by 294% compared to 2023, largely due to Apple's adoption of OLEDs in the 2024 iPad Pro tablets. Laptop OLED sales will increase 152.6%, and monitors OLEDs will increase 139.9%. Finally, OLED TV panel shipments will increase 34.8%.

Omdia estimates that in 2024, OLED technology has finally overtaken LCD and now holds a market share of 53% in the smartphone display market. OLED penetration is expected to increase to 56% in Q3 2024.

Omdia further says that smartphone shipments have increased 5% in 2023 to reach 1.45 billion units, and the market will continue rising in 2024. 

Omdia estimates that growth will return to the OLED materials market after two years of slow OLED TV sales. Material sales will increase to over $2 billion in 2024, for the first time, and will continue growing to reach $2.6 billion by 2028.

Omdia sees an improvement in the utilization of LG's WOLED fabs in 2024. LGD's E4 line in Paju, for example, have rebounded to over 60% in Q1 2024, up from only 33% at the end of 2023. The company's WOLED line in Guangzhou also increased its utilization to over 50%. 

Omdia says that it expects the global smartwatch display market to reach 359 million units in 2024 (up from 259 million units in 2022). OLEDs hold a 37% market share (132 million units).

Omdia says that the leading smartwatch OLED producers, in the first half of 2024, are LG Display (Apple's main supplier), Everdisplay and Tianma - which together hold a 53% market share. China-based wearable OLED production accounts to 64% of the total market.

Omdia says that China's OLED makers have been making rapid progress with their foldable OLED capabilities, to the point that in the first half of 2024, China's production of foldable OLED panels will surpass Korea's.

Omdia predicts that in the first half of 2024, Samsung Display will produce 5.7 million panels, while China's producers will produce 6.4 million panels. The market is set to grow quickly, from 10.7 million units in 2021 to 30 million panels in 2024. The market leader remains Samsung (47% in 2024H1), followed by BOE (40%), Visionox (9%) and TCL CSoT (4%).

Omdia estimates that OLED display shipments for laptops and tablets will grow from around 8 million units in 2023 to around 99 million units in 2031, a CAGR of 37%. We have already seen major laptop and tablet brands starting to adopt OLEDs in their latest devices, including Apple and Microsoft just recently.

Omdia says that in 2022 and 2023, the demand for laptops and tablets actually slowed, but new laptops with AI capabilities are now being introduced, and Omdia expects a recovery in demand for mobile PCs following the discontinuation of Windows 10 support in the second half of 2025.

Omdia says that shipments of OLED displays in tablets are set to grow in the future, rising from around 3.8 million in 2023 to 35 million in 2031. 2024 will see a 315% jump in shipments as Apple starts to adopt OLEDs in its tablets.

Interestingly, Omdia sees an increase in adoption of a 'hybrid OLED' structure (reaching a market share of 85.1% in 2031), which the company defines as a glass-based OLED with a thin-film encapsulation. This hybrid design is lower in cost compared to a flexible OLEDs, while still achieving high performance and a thin design.