Apple Watch Sales Falling Continuously Amid Lack of New Models

[satchmo]

The AW exists because it requires owners to have an iPhone and further lock into the ecosystem.

I'd rather see less restrictive devices that focused on doing one thing really well instead of the current AW that has become a jack of all trade, and master of none.

1) Fitness watch (Ultra) with Garmin-like battery times
2) Low cost health tracking smart band

 

[ApAx]

iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, Mac — Apple can't really be surprised that most of us don't want to spend most of our income on their products alone every single year for incremental changes? Now that the market for these devices has matured, with competition for each one, and features have plateaued, the Apple price is just not feasible for the average consumer. I'm on track for a 6-year cycle for my devices for the second time now.

 

[AlanMarron]

You want me to upgrade from my series 6, bring back pulse ox. Not going to buy a new one until that functionality is restored.

I was on-deck for a 10 but without the O2 sensor, my aging 7 and 9 are just fine.

 

[alphaswift]

I have the AWG while it is a great device I am completely happy with, I will not be upgrading until they can provide glucose measurement. Period.

 

[bluecoast]

No surprise as the watch hasn’t had anything groundbreaking for a while.

Given that blood oxygen isn’t a thing in the USA, you could rock a series 8 and not be missing out on much. Quite frankly, the same goes for most people wherever they live. And if you don’t need wrist temperature and don’t mind the bezels the 2022 SE is probably still fine.

I guess this is why apple is working on the rumoured health+ stuff.

Something with actionable insights and will allow users to get more value out of their existing watch hardware (no doubt it’ll need an iPhone with Apple intelligence though) would be great.

And Apple will welcome the extra $ because health+ is very unlikely to be free (the equivalent for oura users isn’t either).

Apple have been ultra conservative about actionable insights from the watch compared to competitors like oura and it’s sorely missing from the product.

I’ve been having trouble sleeping recently and vitals tells me each morning that my 5.5 hours is average for me. Ok. It may be statistically average for me - but it’s not good. Oura would be trying to help me. But not the Apple Watch.

 

[cheesygrin]

Just recently upgraded my series 4 for a series 10, due to reduced battery life and unsupported software. Honestly it hardly feels any different in daily usage 6 generations apart.

 

[Orange Bat]

My Watch is the one Apple device I never consider upgrading unless it breaks or the battery starts dying. There is little compelling reason to update a device that essentially does everything I need it to do and will probably never offer a new update that convince me to buy a new one. It’s just that kind of device.

 

[xmarcuswildx]

Lack of ox sensor has kept me from buying a new model. Would it have been so hard to pay for the damn rights to use it? Greedy ass Apple man.

 

[Macaholic868]

It makes sense. There’s been very few reasons to upgrade since the 8 (if you were on a much older model) and since then stragglers like me have gone the refurbished route

I refuse to buy the 10 or any further “upgrade” until the blood oxygen monitoring sensor is re-enabled in the USA. Sorry but an upgrade isn’t an upgrade if you’re taking features away. That’s a downgrade.

As somebody with sleep apnea who wears the watch at night, if my blood oxygen readings are poor during the evenings that can be the first clue that there’s an issue with my mask or tubing requiring a replacement or that the CPAP machine itself has an issue.

They’d have to really come up with something innovative to get me to upgrade and loose that. I’d rather wait until the patent in question expires which is dumb when you consider how deep Apple’s pockets are. Don’t tell me they couldn’t “take one for the customer base” and figure out a licensing deal for a few years. That’s just straight up being greedy.

Even if they dangle a blood pressure sensor that can tell you if you may have a problem, I’d need something concrete like actual readings (which I take now with a separate blood pressure monitor) to get me to bite. Until then it’s the earlier 9 model without the blood oxygen sensor that turns off for the foreseeable future.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

I'm down for the first watch that has a round screen. I've been eyeing the Samsung ones, but would prefer an Apple watch or Pebble Round.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Watches are a fashion item of sorts, in a way the other Apple devices are not.

They really need a lot more diversity of shapes/sizes to appeal to a wider range of interests.

 

[theworker11223]

I don't know if Apple's realizing, or hopefully they do realize that they don't have to launch everything every year. Every two years might give them time to put something that's different.

 

[DocMultimedia]

Besides just the lack of new/useful features on the Watch, the software really hasn't brought anything significant to it in a long time. I have a 10 but really see no reason to upgrade for a long time (unless as other said, a smaller Ultra comes out). I'm a big runner, hiker, and biker, but a pretty slim guy. A tough watch with long battery life would be nice.

 

[fuchsdh]

I upgraded to a S7 from my 4 just because I managed to crack the face. The battery is no longer great, but since I don't use the AOD it's still sufficient for a day of heavy usage/workouts. Low Power mode, the better screen, faster processor, etc will all be welcome improvements when I do upgrade but there's tradeoffs too (losing the blood ox sensor and the larger size) so I'm not rushing to upgrade, especially with the economic outlook coming for us in the US.

I dunno what Apple could do to change up the longer product cycles—the Apple Watch could stand to last longer and be thinner, but there's no way to do both with current tech, let alone do one or both while also adding more capabilities.

I don't know if Apple's realizing, or hopefully they do realize that they don't have to launch everything every year. Every two years might give them time to put something that's different.

Yeah I wonder about this. They've already got the low and high-end SE/Ultra at a slower cadence. At what point does the reduced sales from having the same product for two years outweighed by the reduced costs of bringing that product to market and the bigger upgrade cycles when you do release? Arguably all of Apple's products save the Vision Pro are now in that "mature" product category where the only reason to release them yearly is so there's always a newer version for people on long upgrade cycles to jump to.

 

[Jason2000]

Make a round version to sell along the square one. That will spur sales.

 

[stocklen]

I got booed for suggesting this, but if they did a smaller Ultra, I'd love to upgrade. I want a rugged watch but not one that is huge or have the screen size as the Ultra.

But they definitely need more features.

me too but you know they do the series 10 etc in a titanium and sapphire glass screen.

Almost as expensive as the ultra but actually better spec this year and so much thinner and lighter.

Sounds like exactly what you are looking for. Unless of course you prefer the stylings of the ultra but you can either have big and chunky or smaller and sleeker.

 

[DrKarl]

...

I refuse to buy the 10 or any further “upgrade” until the blood oxygen monitoring sensor is re-enabled in the USA. Sorry but an upgrade isn’t an upgrade if you’re taking features away. That’s a downgrade.

As somebody with sleep apnea who wears the watch at night, if my blood oxygen readings are poor during the evenings that can be the first clue that there’s an issue with my mask or tubing requiring a replacement or that the CPAP machine itself has an issue.

They’d have to really come up with something innovative to get me to upgrade and loose that. I’d rather wait until the patent in question expires which is dumb when you consider how deep Apple’s pockets are. Don’t tell me they couldn’t “take one for the customer base” and figure out a licensing deal for a few years. That’s just straight up being greedy.
...

Yeah, same boat. Started CPAP last fall and upgraded to 10 both for its sleep features (over my old 5 ...which replaced a model "0") ... under the assumption that surely Apple had the $$$ to license the oxygen sensor tech and it would be re-enabled quickly. Well, foolish me.

It's great to see that the sleep disturbances on the 10 match exactly the the AHI events reported by my ResMed Airsense 11 CPAP machine... but I really need/want the oxygen sensor to know if my levels drop and by how much.

Just cannot believe Apple has dragged on this patent issue for as long as they have without settling.

 

[mlayer]

It feels to me that this is simply an issue of longer upgrade cycles. People don’t see the need to keep replacing their Apple Watch every few years, and that’s fine. What is important is that people continue to use Apple Watches, and are not actively ditching them for other brands. Not least because it keeps users in the Apple ecosystem and buying iPhones (or at least, keep using them).

I upgraded to a series 10 last year after wearing a series 5 for 5 years. I don’t really feel like I need any new features, but I do like the utility, and I continue to see myself wearing one for the near foreseeable future. 🙂

I went from the Series 4 to the Series 9. 5 years seems to be the de facto upgrade cycle. On my S4 the battery degraded to the point of needing multiple charges per day. The S9 is faster, more reliable, has the bigger m, brighter always-on screen. The pace of change is so incremental on Apple Watch that it takes several years to notice the difference. There’s nothing wrong with that. I would like to see blood glucose sensing the next time I buy, not sure if that’s a reasonable expectation.

 

[Zdigital2015]

The (lack of) upgrades last year told me that Apple is in cruise control mode and these results should not surprise anyone. Color changes and an uninspiring Watch Series 10 couple with the whiff on the Ultra 3 and no new SE left me cold. A new SE and new Ultra 3 this year are pretty imperative.

 

[BC2009]

I will buy a new one just as soon as they settle with Masimo and bring back the blood oxygen app to the United States. Until then, I am sticking with Series 7. I am not going to pay hundreds of dollars to lose a feature.

 

[Return Zero]

I went from 1 to 4 to 7 and might snag a 10 if there's any good clearance soon... Basically every time they've increased screen size I've upgraded. I could care less about 80% of the features. I just love having time, date, weather, market, notifications, etc. available at a quick glance without pulling my phone out. The bigger the screen, the more instant info I can get.

 

[one more]

This is to be expected, IMO.

Essentially, any smartwatch (not just Apple) is just an extra buzzer on our wrist that is an extension of a smartphone, but not its adequate replacement. As smartphones eliminated the need in regular watches for many people, the same is now happening to smartwatches as the “cool new gadget” phase wore out. The smartphones are still relevant, but they too might soon be replaced by a different tech. Jony Ive and Open AI are not working on a new AI portable device for nothing and Apple need to step up.

 

[tpipher]

I upgraded my AW yearly along with my Iphone Pro Max. I have not upgraded my AW since it lost Pulse Ox and will NOT upgrade till it returns. I have a AW 8.

 

[Kylo83]

Because the series 10 was a downgrade the bezels were bigger and looks worse that’s why I stayed with series 9

 

[cdsapplefan]

Apple is going to have to add new health features like BP monitoring if they hope to spur sales. Some of these are difficult to do well, but it's hard to understand why they haven't at least brought back oxygen measurements by coming to an agreement with Masimo.

From Google AI:

“Masimo's key patents related to pulse oximetryand Apple Watch features, which are the subject of ongoing litigation, are scheduled to expire in August 2028. Apple could reactivate the blood oxygen measurement feature on its devices after that date, if it does not resolve the current lawsuit or innovate a new design that does not infringe on Masimo's patents.“