Apple Sold an Estimated 600,000 HomePod Speakers During the First Quarter of 2018

[DNichter]

I am happy with my HomePod. I don't think Apple should stress the numbers so much as Google's and Amazon's offerings sell for under $50. Just focus on the product, provide solid updates and features, and more buyers will come. I expect it to sell similarly to the Apple Watch.

 

[democracyrules]

Apple sold an estimated 600,000 HomePod speakers during the first quarter of 2018, according to new estimates shared this morning by Strategy Analytics. Apple's sales allowed it to capture just 6 percent of the global smart speaker market, coming in well behind Amazon and Google.

Amazon shipped an estimated 4 million Echo smart speakers during the quarter, for a 43.6 percent share of the market, while Google shipped an estimated 2.4 million Google Home speakers for 26.5 percent market share. Alibaba also came in ahead of Apple with 700,000 shipments, while Xiaomi trailed behind with 200,000.

Apple has a long way to go to catch up to Google and Amazon, both of whom have seen an enormous growth in shipments over the course of the past year. Amazon's shipments increased by two million compared to Q1 2017, while Google's increased by 2.1 million.

Amazon's market share has fallen year over year due to strong sales of Google speakers and new entrants to the market like Apple, Alibaba, and Xiaomi, but Amazon continues to be the number one smart speaker vendor in the world by far.

In total, across all vendors, there were an estimated 9.2 million smart speaker units shipped during the first quarter of 2018. Apple is, at the current time, the fourth largest smart speaker brand worldwide with the HomePod, but its meager sales are not yet impacting major players Google and Amazon.

Both Google and Amazon have been in the smart speaker business for a longer period of time and the two companies also offer speakers at a range of price points. A Google Home speaker, for example, can be purchased for as little as $129 (or $49 for the mini version), while an Amazon Echo costs just $99.99. The Echo Dot is even more affordable at $49.

Apple's sole speaker, the HomePod, is priced at $349. Apple focused heavily on audio quality with the hopes that consumers would be willing to pay more for a device that had superior sound, but the higher price tag, a delayed feature set, and the lack of native support for music services like Spotify have likely stymied Apple's sales.

The HomePod is still new and Apple has just entered the smart speaker market, so improvements and changes to future products could drastically change its position and present some real competition for Amazon and Google. Apple is rumored to be considering a lower-priced HomePod that would perhaps sell for $150 to $200.

Article Link: Apple Sold an Estimated 600,000 HomePod Speakers During the First Quarter of 2018

I am one of the lucky ones who could get 4 for each main room at my house. I am still captivated by how awesome the audio quality.

 

[Art Mark]

Such a silly set of numbers derived from very little actual info. I have an amazon echo, unplugged in my front room. I haven't found the 'home smart speaker' all that useful at this time. I'm thinking they are a minor market of devices that quickly gather dust, but they sell due to fairly cheap pricing.

 

[Princejb134]

ditch siri , add bluetooth and cut the price by a few bucks

ipod 2

wait your telling me it has no bluetooth?

 

[PHL2PBI]

I have one and enjoy the quality of the sound. I really don't use it for anything else.

 

[ThunderSkunk]

Build a time capsule and AirPort Extreme into it, and stick a plug for an old fashioned airplay speaker setup into it, and we'll talk.

And an Apple TV.


I hate clutter. That thing should do all the apple home stuff in one device. And it should be smart enough to set itself up. ...and if it can't figure your Rube Goldberg Machine of a house out, it should ask you if you want to connect you to the nice Indian lady who will help you sort yourself out. Actually do this thing all the way, Apple. Then sell the hell out of them.

 

[carlsson]

Drop the damn price.

$249 and a hell of lot more people would buy this gimped product.

For me the audio quality is a deal breaker and I’d happily pay the current price. But I can’t, because I live in Sweden and the home pod is yet to arrive....

 

[kanki1985]

how about profits? I guess Apple will be right behind Amazon..

 

[Kebabselector]

Is is tweakable in software to lower the bass? Thought it was too bass heavy for my liking when I tried it.

 

[macduke]

I'm willing to pay more for a superior sounding speaker, but the fact remains that Siri is kinda garbage and I just don't think this device is very useful or smart at this point. This is like Apple launching the $999 iPhone X in 2007 or the $4999 iMac Pro in 1998. You start out with the mass market product and then you work up the price chain from there. You have to get the momentum going and the brand recognition. The primary exception to that is the iPod but I think it's sales started off pretty slow as well and it didn't take off massively until the cheaper Mini/Nano came out. They should have started with a device in the $149-199 price range and released it this autumn when they had the software ready. Make it sound better than an Echo but don't go crazy with the sound quality just yet. Then in a few years they could have released HomePod X or whatever priced at $349.

 

[foobarbaz]

Wow. 6% of the global is actually way higher than I expected, especially since it's only available in a handful of countries.

The iPhone's market share is only twice as high, and it's available everywhere. Seems like they would have hit the same number if it was a worldwide launch.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Build a time capsule and AirPort Extreme into it, and stick a plug for an old fashioned airplay speaker setup into it, and we'll talk.

And an Apple TV.


I hate clutter. That thing should do all the apple home stuff in one device.

Apple price: about $649-$849???

Time Capsule storage sold separately?

Plug is Lightning 2 with connectors only available from Apple for about 6 months?

 

[tubular]

Very happy with mine. Music via AirPlay from a music server, Siri for lighting and weather updates. I’ll buy a second one when AirPlay 2 hits.

 

[bladerunner2000]

"Global Shipments", but you can barely buy the homepod anywhere in the world..

You wouldn't want to even if you could. The thing is a garbage product.

 

[ThunderSkunk]

Apple price: about $649-$849???

Time Capsule storage sold separately?

Plug is Lightning 2 with connectors only available from Apple for about 6 months?

$1000. Back to Apples roots, a thousand dollar computer with no display. And build all the best of all their home products into it, and then put a nice slow USB-2 interface on it to transfer data, and a mini-USB plug to reset it, The cable for which is neither included with the thing nor found in apples inventory. ...in keeping with the wise decisions of Apples home products design team.

 

[zemaker]

the price, it'll never happen with the price.

 

[Quu]

These numbers may be a bit skewed as iJustine bought about 100,000 of those.

 

[DNichter]

Build a time capsule and AirPort Extreme into it, and stick a plug for an old fashioned airplay speaker setup into it, and we'll talk.

And an Apple TV.


I hate clutter. That thing should do all the apple home stuff in one device. And it should be smart enough to set itself up. ...and if it can't figure your Rube Goldberg Machine of a house out, it should ask you if you want to connect you to the nice Indian lady who will help you sort yourself out. Actually do this thing all the way, Apple. Then sell the hell out of them.

I somewhat agree with you, but then you run into the issue of having to have the modem in the same spot that you want your smart speakers and Apple TV. It can be messy, but I agree, something combining all of this stuff would be nice.

 

[cashville2400]

I love my Echo devices and all the things they can control. I was still going to add a homepod, but then I saw the price and that it did not work with Spotify. After that I was out. Oh, and another reason, Siri seems dated and really needs to be improved. Why is Apple so damn stubborn?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I’m happy with mine, it sounds great and no doubt Siri will be improved with future updates

I asked Siri "will you be improved with future updates?"
Reply "Sorry I can't help you with that."
BUT, it translated "will you" into "William" so...

Me: "Will Siri be improved with future updates?"
Siri: "I'm sorry I can't do that here"

Me: "Will Siri get any smarter?"
Siri: "That may be beyond my abilities at the moment"

I wish I was making these up but those are literal exchanges with Siri just now.

Me: "Is Alexa smarter than you?"
Siri: "Who me?"
Me: "Yes"
Siri: "That's what I thought"

Me: "How smart are you?"
Siri: "I guess you'll have to be the judge of that"

 

[KazKam]

TBH I'm surprised it sold that many. Besides being overpriced (arguably), it's essentially an Apple Music accessory. With AM subscribers at a measly 5-10% of Apple IDs (that's being generous), and most of those people having other means to amplify their music, be it existing headphones, home hi-fi, Sonos, echo, BT speakers, etc. There seems little room left for a market for these things.

 

[racerhomie]

Homepod is great. But I really hoped they would round the number to $400.

 

[AxiomaticRubric]

So they make a weak entrance into the smart speaker market after neglecting, then killing off the AirPort and Time Capsule home wifi products.

I’m totally seeing the logic here!

 

[blancoBronco]

I'd be all over the HomePod if it could control as many devices as my echo can. I would love to get a device that has the connectivity of the echo but the fidelity of the HomePod

honest question, what devices are you wanting it to be able to control? I know that the echo and google home are compatible with many more products, but what major ones can the HomePod not work with?

 

[ipedro]

Siri and its API will likely be a major focus at WWDC. I also expect that HomePod will become the testbed for Siri going forward like AppleWatch has become for technologies that roll out to the iPhone, the most notable of which was 3D Touch and the OLED screen. With that in mind, I think we're going to see some serious advancements in Siri come to HomePod first.

Also like the Watch and its big watchOS 2.0 update, HomePod is ripe for a major leap less than a year after its release since so much was probably left on the development table that just didn't make it to launch day.

I predict these improvements to HomePod to be announced at WWDC:

There's of course the low hanging fruit like Stereo pairing and AirPlay 2 but also Calendar support which has been leaked in iOS beta.

Multi User support is important for every other feature that comes from here on out because it depends on identifying the correct user. And it isn't that difficult. Apple already does Voice ID in iOS and the HomePod's beam forming microphones are far more sensitive. I expect the HomePod would do its best to guess on identifying who is speaking and if it's unsure, Siri could ask: "Is this John?"

Continuous Conversation. Rather than having to say Hey Siri for each prompt, Siri would listen for a few more seconds in case you have follow up questions.

What else do you think will come to HomePod at WWDC?

I started a thread where you can post your speculation on HomePod announcements at WWDC in this thread:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/homepod-wwdc-speculation.2119160/