15 interesting facts we learned from Apple’s Q3 2015 earnings call

Apple announced its financial results for its fiscal third quarter of 2015 this afternoon, and the numbers are solid. The company sold 47.5 million iPhones and earned $49.6 billion in revenue, breaking June quarter records and beating Wall Street expectations.

So that you don’t have to trawl through all the reports to catch up, we’ve put together a handy list of 15 interesting facts that’ll teach you all you need to know.

• Apple sold 47 million iPhones and 10.9 million iPads during the quarter, which means iOS devices are matching Windows PC sales for the first time.
• iPhone revenue was up 59 percent over last year, and 27 percent of existing iPhone users have now upgraded to an iPhone 6 oriPhone 6 Plus.
• Apple also sold 4.7 million Macs, which alongside iOS and “other” devices — such as the Apple TV and Apple Watch — raked in a combined total of $49.6 billion in revenue, and $10.7 billion in profit. That makes Q3 2015 another record quarter for the Cupertino company.
• That profit, from just one quarter, is more than the GDP of a long list of countries, including Madagascar, Bahamas, Monaco, Sierra Leone, and Barbados.
• Apple’s “other” category rose 49 percent to bring in $2.64 billion, and Apple Watch is getting much of the credit for that.
• Apple did not disclose sales figures for the Watch, but CEO Tim Cook says the device “did exceed our expectations” during the quarter, despite a struggle to keep up with demand.
• Apple Watch has sold more units during its first nine weeks of availability than both the iPhone and the iPad did during a similar period after launch.
• We did not get definitive figures for Apple Music, either, but Apple said “millions and millions of customers” have already signed up to the streaming service, which is free for the first three months.
• Apple saw record revenue from services this quarter, generating $5 billion. App Store revenue alone grew 24 percent.

• Apple made more than twice as much revenue as Microsoft, which saw its revenue drop 5.1 percent to $22.18 billion as it reported its biggest-ever quarterly loss this week.
• Much of Apple’s growth can be attributed to China, where revenue doubled during the third quarter to reach a whopping $13.2 billion. Apple’s sales in China were also up 87 percent — despite the weakening condition of the Chinese economy.
• China is now a bigger market for Apple than all of Europe combined.
• 80,000 businesses are adding support for Apple Pay every single month, and Apple expects 1.5 million locations in the U.S. to support the service by the end of 2015.
• Apple is sitting on $203 billion in cash reserves; that’s around double the cash reserves of Microsoft, around three times those of Google, and around four times those of Cisco.
• Apple now has 456 retail stores worldwide, 190 of which are located in the U.S. The company plans to open 40 in Greater China by the middle of 2016.