Huawei is the only top tablet brand seeing growth

The tablet market continues to decline, according to first quarter numbers from IDC, but one China company has reason to be optimistic about the market: Huawei. Huawei was the only top-five tablet brand to see shipments grow year-over-year with a surprising 31.7 percent rise. Tablet shipments as a whole declined 8.5 percent.

The company is currently pursuing a two-pronged approach to its tablet offerings: Windows and Android. Next to the iPad, which has many apps appropriately modified to fit larger screens, Android tablets do not perform as well. Windows has become a viable alternative for consumers looking for an alternative to Android tablets for productivity-related tasks.

The Huawei MateBook is perhaps the company's best-known effort in pursuing Windows tablets. It has a keyboard case and runs on an Intel Core m7 processor. It's not as powerful as Microsoft's own Surface Pro tablets, but it's designed to compete on the lower end of that market segment.

This strategy is similar to Samsung, which announced a new Android tablet and two new Windows tablets this year. Samsung doesn't want to neglect consumers who still prefer a mobile operating system on a tablet. In fairness to the Korea-based company, it has also introduced many software modifications that might make Android better suited for a tablet. Still, Samsung can't fix the problem with Android apps on larger screens. Next to the more powerful Windows tablets Samsung offers under the Galaxy Book name, the $600 Galaxy Tab S3 doesn't look very appealing. Among other top brands, however, Samsung saw the lowest decline in shipments at 1.1 percent.

Although Apple saw iPad shipments fall 13 percent, it held onto the top spot with 24.6 percent market share. Samsung was second place at 16.5 percent and Huawei came in third at 7.4 percent. Amazon's strategy of using cheap tablets as a way to push content consumption appears to be paying off. It edged out Lenovo with 6 percent market share compared to the Chinese technology giant's 5.7 percent.

While there appears to be some room left in the market for cheap Android tablets, many are now betting on detachable Windows tablets. Detachablesare doing better than convertibles, according to IDC, even though Huawei, Samsung and Microsoft all seem to be doing relatively well in the latter. Even Microsoft has its detachable Surface Book. These devices are getting cheaper, too. Chuwi's Hi13, which the company showed off at the Global Sources Mobile Electronics show, sells for under $400 and uses the same display as the Surface Book.