Analyst figures reveal big boom in smartwatch popularity
Tech’s biggest name is dominating in the smartwatch market – according to a new report published by Canalys, which states there have been almost 7 million Apple Watch sales since it went on sale earlier this year.
The report states that, in its second quarter of sales, the 7 million figure was hit – a number it states is more than all other smartwatch brands over the last five quarters combined. Wowsers.
To put things into perspective, the Pebble Time Steel shipped around 200,000 units in its first quarter and no other brand has more than 300,000 smartwatch sales in a quarter.
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“Shipments are steadily increasing as it has greatly expanded the Watch’s channel footprint internationally.” said Chris Jones, Canalys VP and principal analyst. “WatchOS 2 has brought native apps to the platform, and new colors and styles have refreshed the lineup, but Apple needs to continue to generate demand six months after launch.”
Apple is still refusing to comment on official Watch sales. It has stuck to that line on its last two earnings calls, instead lumping smartwatch sales in with other Apple accessories.
In July, Tim Cook did say sales were off to “a great start” and had “exceeded internal expectations”.
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Cook asked investors not to try and guess Watch sales based on the overall accessories category that made $2.6 billion for Apple in Q2 though – a $952 million increase over the previous quarter.
Estimates put sales between 2.5 and 5.7 million units in total with an average of 4 million. So an extra 3 million in Q3 isn’t all that unlikely.