Apple has announced more storming results for its wearables segment, with a record-breaking quarter for the Apple Watch.
The Apple Watch grew 50% in terms of revenue, which represents the best non-holidays quarter of all time. And perhaps even more tellingly, 75% of sales are to first-time Apple Watch users, showing that uptake isn’t slowing.
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“The [Apple Watch business] is now about the size of a Fortune 200 company, an amazing statistic when you consider it’s only been four years since we delivered the very first Apple Watch,” said Tim Cook, Apple CEO.
Impressive stuff, as Apple CFO Luca Maestri explained:
“Wearables, home and accessories revenue set a new March quarter revenue record at 5.1 billion, fuelled primarily by the strong performance of our wearables business, which grew close to 50 percent.
“Within this category, Apple Watch is the best-selling and most loved smartwatch in the world, and produced its best results ever for a non-holiday quarter. It’s reaching many new customers, with three-quarters of purchases going to customers who have never owned an Apple Watch before,”
This confirms what we already know – that Apple is totally bossing the smartwatch market.
But it shows how much appetite there is for this segment, and that’s good news for everyone. The walled garden of iOS and high ticket price means there’s always room for other companies to play, which explains the success of the Fitbit Versa and Samsung Galaxy Watch.
Momentum behind Apple Watch underlined by Apple’s CFO stating three-quarters of sales are to new users. The Apple Watch has quietly gained impressive traction and is a tremendous lock-in. Once you own one you have to keep an iPhone to make it work.
— Ben Wood (@benwood) May 1, 2019
However, as CCS Insight’s Ben Wood tweeted – it’s also a great lock-in. The Apple Watch can only be used with iPhones, so those millions of people who are investing are far more likely to stay within the iOS ecosystem with a new iPhone.
How we test
James is the co-founder of Wareable, and he has been a technology journalist for 15 years.
He started his career at Future Publishing, James became the features editor of T3 Magazine and T3.com and was a regular contributor to TechRadar – before leaving Future Publishing to found Wareable in 2014.
James has been at the helm of Wareable since 2014 and has become one of the leading experts in wearable technologies globally. He has reviewed, tested, and covered pretty much every wearable on the market, and is passionate about the evolving industry, and wearables helping people achieve healthier and happier lives.