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Nearly Half of All Smartwatches Shipped Last Quarter Were Apple Watches
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I understand that the watch is optimized for shorter interactions. What I'm saying is I don't even see much of those.
I give you that they could be glancing at an email or text. But what I'm not seeing much of is quick replies, etc.
I would expect to witness people using their SmartWatches more often then I do. It makes me wonder if most people (i.e. the Joe public) who buy them don't get much actual "smart" use out of their snartwatches.
People are only buying the Apple Watch for the logo, even though it has no logo. Awesome logic!
Some of my friends bought them and tried really hard to use them. Went back to regular watches that look nicer and don't require setup or charging. It's just a marketing-driven fad, i.e. not even popular naturally but forced. I understand the use of those fitness devices like Fitbit that are a step below a smart watch, though.
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That people are willing to pay more for a better experience. Nobody cares about the logo.
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If AppleWatch is still considered a huge failure, then what about all the other smartwatches. Usually, AppleWatch is singled out as being one of the worst products Apple has ever made but I'm not exactly sure why. It seems to be a good product that is mostly hobbled by old battery technology. I'm not sure why it's considered a failure. Is it based on poorly implemented features or because sales were expected to be much higher? What sales number does a product have to reach to be considered a success? 10 million units? 20 million units? I just don't get it.
The two reasons I don't own an AppleWatch is that it needs to be tethered to an iPhone and I don't want to have to charge a watch battery every night.
The two reasons I don't own an AppleWatch is that it needs to be tethered to an iPhone and I don't want to have to charge a watch battery every night.
I look at mine 10 times more then my iPhone, notifications go to my watch. In fact my iPhone stays in my pocket unless I need a picture or respond at length. I even take selfies or group tripod pictures using my watch as the screen. Rather then connect to the car for my iPhone calls, just use the watch. The workout and activity Monitor are heavily used, as is the health app using the data from the watch. Second only to my iPhone, the watch, a useful device.
I came here to post the same thing.
We know the Apple Watch will never sell as many units as... let's say the iPhone... which seems to be what people try to compare it to.
Well if that's the measure of success... no other smartwatch will sell as many units as the iPhone either! So they're all failures!
I think Apple is doing amazingly well with their smartwatch sales. It's a product that can generate almost a billion dollars in revenue... in three months. Sad trombone need not apply here.
Are we supposed to celebrate Fossil selling 300,000 units... but bemoan Apple selling 3,400,000 units during the same time?
And what about the companies who have already left the market? Pebble and Motorola... once leaders in the smartwatch market... gone.
Now there's Apple still going strong at #1... Samsung with their Tizen offerings a distant #2... and a bunch of fitness-focused watches and other smartwatches rounding out the list.
I think the real loser here is Android Wear.
Look at that list. Apple Watch runs a variant of iOS... Samsung watches run Tizen... Garmin watches run their own OS... and I'm unfamiliar with Continental Wireless (who?) so I can't comment on them.
Android Wear finally makes an appearance on the list at #5 with Fossil... with 4.8% of the market.
Perhaps if all the "other" smartwatches ran Android Wear... it might have over 20% of the market. But I'm guessing the rest of the market is cheap smartwatches with questionable smart features.
So I kinda feel bad for Android Wear... but I certainly don't feel bad for Apple and the Apple Watch.
You're right... it's not the "failure" everyone says it is. Other companies wish they could have a "failure" like the Apple Watch.
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Aboveavalon has done so. It's behind a paywall though (I am a subscriber), but I should be able to provide the following information without much repercussions.
3Q15: 2.6M
4Q15: 3.2M
1Q16: 4.7M
2Q16: 1.6M
3Q16: 1.8M
4Q16: 1.8M
1Q17: 5.6M
2Q17: 3.2M
3Q17: 2.7M
Total: 27.2M
Note that it's an estimate, but he's been fairly spot-on with his analysis on Apple so far, so YMMV.
Thanks!!!
I remember when it was a big deal when Pebble sold a million cumulative smartwatches.
Boy how times have changed!
It was (and still is) for a startup the size of pebble. It's clear they lacked the ability to scale at the rate that Apple could, but I still think it's impressive that Pebble was able to do what they did given the resources at their disposal (not just cash, but engineering talent). It was my first smartwatch and while primitive by today's standards, it sold me on the whole "notifications on the wrist" paradigm. I just couldn't go back to a normal watch afterwards.Thanks!!!
I remember when it was a big deal when Pebble sold a million cumulative smartwatches.
Boy how times have changed!
That said, it was clear that Pebble was destined to go down Blackberry's path. Using the Pebble watch with my iPhone had its fair share of limitations (inability to act on notifications being one), there was only so much Pebble could do when they don't own the platform, the 3rd party apps were crap, and I knew it was only a matter of time before Apple jumped in with their own integrated offering.
It's a multi billion dollar profit line for Apple, it's already an assured product line.
But you just know that all but maybe half a dozen of those 27 million are gathering dust in desk drawers, since it has long been pronounced a failure by the cream of the crop of doomsayers on MacRumors. And those half dozen that are in use are only worn by sad nerds who wouldn't know a real watch if it hit them in the head. Remember, real watches are round, and if it's not round, it can't be a watch.
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It was the os, it’s been tweaked and revised. First gen watches run quite well even on watch os4, even though the newer hardware is an improvement.
Indeed, going from watchOS 2 to watchOS 3 made my series 0 feel like an entirely new watch. I'd love a series 3, but I don't really need to upgrade from my original.
The smartwatch market today.
The wearables market tomorrow.
Onwards, Apple. All the way to the top!!!
It means the smart Watch market as a whole isn't nearly as a large as Some appear to think it is. Given what does Apple sell monthly for an Apple Watch? Just over or under 2/2.5 Million Apple Watches. That said, there isn't much competition against the Apple Watch right now. Pebble sold out to to Fitbit. Fitbit and Garmin being the biggest competitors, but they are geared mored towards the fitness side versus "Smart Watch" era. But in the actual Smart Watch category, Android wear is the only other real competitor with LTE and Tizen.
When you factor in the overall popularity of the of the number one selling smart Phone in the world, naturally the Apple Watch will be the successor in someone's first choice when the dabble into the smart watch sector. So I think part of that success goes to the iPhone, because the user has no other options for a smart watch . And that's not me being dismissive of the Apple Watch, because I truly enjoy mine, but it's also something that's a fact due to the success of the iPhone. But nonetheless, the Apple Watch is just as successful.
Aside from all of that, it's also about how Apple continuously improves the watchOS experience significantly since it's first inception with watchOS one compared to watchOS 4 watching debuting shortly. That's what makes the Apple Watch better, is because Apple continuously improves the user experience to make it more of a tool than just a gadget.
Who said anything about fashion? I'm well aware of the evolutionary path of the pocket watch and the wristwatch. The smart watch is another evolution. You can call it a fad. But keep in mind that's likely what a lot of people carrying pocket watches called the newfangled wristwatches when they started gaining popularity. Technology changes. The round design of watches was driven by their analog faces and the path taken by their hands, which was the mechanism they could make at the time (small enough and accurate enough). Digital technology and screens make that unnecessary. Now, a round face on a smart watch is a nod to fashion and familiarity, not something necessitated by the available technology. The Apple Watch looks like a watch, because it is one. It looks different than an analog watch, but that doesn't make it any less of a watch.
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The wearables market isn't huge yet. The smarphone market wasn't really huge in 2005. Now people might question your sanity if you don't have one (not because it's fashionable, because it's incredibly useful). The digital camera market wasn't huge in 1990. (In 1990 few people outside of research facilities and universities knew what the Internet was). Its surprising how fast things that people previously didn't know existed, become both indispensable and ubiquitous. Wearables are coming.
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I wish the heart rate sensor had an accuracy of a chest strap monitor. That is a pretty important use case for me. I keep reading reports that during Insanity kind of workouts the accuracy of ALL wrist based heart sensors is abysmal.
How something looks is affected by fashion. Fashion affects what we call the typical look. And you were talking about how watches looked (today and in the past).
It's not only a nod, it is also more symmetric than a rectangle. And remember, symmetry is what makes humans consider something to be attractive.
That's circular reasoning, which is somewhat ironic. Something that isn't X can't suddenly become X simply because it is sold as such. (Yes, I'm joking here, there are many non-circular - and hence ugly-ass - watches, but...)
Yes, and pocket watches were miniature variants of clocks - clocks with hands that sweep in circular motions.
Look, of course this is all subjective. I prefer watches to be round because I'm old and old-fashioned.
/edit - typo.
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I own a Samsung phone and a Samsung Watch (because I prefer my watches round, not fugly), but I also own an iPad Pro and a top-of-the-line MBP 2017. It is possible to enjoy products from multiple companies.
/edit2 - wow, nice post merge feature!
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Now you've escalated from circular reasoning fallacies to tautologies.
Apple sold almost half a billion iPhones over that period so roughly 5% of the potential target audience has purchased the Watch. Not a bad start but still a (lucrative) niche product.