The Used Smartphone Market in 2026: iPhone vs. Samsung Resale Value

Smartphones remain the engine of the secondary electronics market, and in 2026 the gap between how different brands hold value is as important as ever for anyone sourcing, refurbishing, or reselling at volume. Understanding depreciation isn’t academic — it determines which lots are worth processing and which are barely worth the freight.

The headline: iPhones still hold value better

Across the board, flagship iPhones continue to retain a larger share of their original price over time than comparable Android flagships. A two-to-three-year-old iPhone typically commands a meaningfully higher percentage of its launch price than a Samsung Galaxy S-series phone of the same age. Several structural factors drive this.

• Long software support keeps older iPhones viable for years, sustaining demand.
• Brand consistency and a simple model lineup make iPhones easy to price and resell.
• Global demand — iPhones have deep resale markets on nearly every continent.

Where Samsung competes — and wins

That doesn’t make Samsung a weak play. Galaxy flagships depreciate faster in the first year, which means they can be acquired cheaper — and for a refurbisher, acquisition cost is half the margin equation. Samsung’s improving software-support timelines are also flattening the depreciation curve on newer models. And in specific regional markets, Samsung demand rivals or exceeds Apple.

What actually drives resale price

Brand is only the starting point. At the unit level, resale value is set by:

• Model and storage tier — higher-storage variants hold value disproportionately well.
• Battery health — increasingly the single biggest swing factor for buyers.
• Cosmetic grade — screens and frames; cracks collapse value fastest.
• Lock and blacklist status — carrier-locked or blacklisted units are worth a fraction of clean ones.
• Region and channel — the same phone can fetch very different prices across marketplaces and countries.

What it means for your inventory

The practical takeaway: don’t grade lots by brand reputation alone. iPhones give you dependable resale and liquidity; Samsung and other Android devices can deliver stronger margins when acquired at the right point on their steeper depreciation curve. The operators who win are the ones who price at the model-and-condition level and have a refurbishment partner who can economically process a mixed bag of both.

Volume sellers increasingly find that the real money isn’t in the pristine flagships everyone wants — it’s in the mixed, imperfect lots that most refurbishers won’t touch, processed at a cost structure that makes the recovery worth it.