The global smartwatch market is not nearly as big as often predicted. Total shipments for the final quarter of 2016 were only 8.2 million units, up 1% from last year. Apple Inc.’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) smartwatch accounted for 5.2 million, or 63%, of those shipments. On that basis, the Apple Watch will not be the next iPhone.
Samsung, in second place, barely shipped any inventory at all — just 800,000 units, for a share of 10%. That was down from 1.3 million units shipped in the fourth quarter of the previous year. All these data come from a new study by Strategy Analytics.
Cliff Raskind, director at Strategy Analytics, said:
We estimate Apple shipped a record 5.2 million smartwatches worldwide and captured a dominant 63 percent marketshare in Q4 2016, rising a steady 2 percent annually from 5.1 million units in Q4 2015. Demand for Apple’s new Watch Series 2 as a holiday-season gift in Western markets was surprisingly strong and it enabled Apple to clear a large backlog of smartwatch inventory during the quarter.
Now that the holidays are over, the company has to contend with Apple Watch sales in a less festive market.
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