Samsung Electronics became the world's No.1 handset seller across all continents in the third quarter, winning the title for the first time in the company's history, a US-based market researcher said Wednesday.

Samsung ranked first in terms of global handset sales in the third quarter in many regions, including North America, Western Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Eastern Europe as well as Middle East and Africa, where Samsung beat Nokia for the first time, according to Strategic Analytics.

Samsung sold a total of 120.1 million mobile phones across the globe in the third quarter, taking up the market share of 28.6 percent.

The company sold 15.8 million mobile phones in the Middle East and African regions during the quarter, higher than Nokia's 14.7 million sales.

Samsung's market share in the above regions was 36.4 percent, jumping from 24.4 percent last year.

The company expects to supply half of the smartphones sold in Africa this year and aims to double these sales on the continent in 2014, Reuters reported Wednesday, citing Thabiet Allie, head of content and services for Samsung Electronics Africa.

Africa has a growing young population that is increasingly tech savvy and urbanized. This is attracting foreign sellers of consumer products like smartphones, especially as markets stagnate or shrink in more developed nations.

Although smartphones are gaining popularity across the continent, they are still a novelty. At the end of 2012, sub-Saharan smartphone penetration was 4 percent, compared with a global average of 17 percent, according to industry body GSMA.

Out of the 100 million or so mobile phones sold in Africa this year, 20 million are smartphones and slightly more than half of those are models made by the South Korean company, said Allie.

In Western Europe, the market share difference between Samsung and Nokia widened to 27.7 percentage points in the third quarter, with the gaps in Latin America and Eastern Europe gaining to 13.4 percentage points and 14.4 percentage points respectively.

In the North American region, Samsung's market share declined 3.4 percentage points in the third quarter due to the launch of Apple's new models, but the South Korean company maintained the No.1 position in the region with a market share 9 percentage points higher than Apple's.