Last year, Apple Watch and AirPods combined to give Apple almost a quarter of the world’s wearable shipments. The total was nearly double the next closest rival.
Shipments of these Apple products grew tremendously in 2018, outpacing the wearables market as a whole.
Apple tops global wearable market in 2018
This company shipped 46.2 million wearable devices last annum, a year-over-year increase of 39.5 percent, according to market-research firm IDC.
The trend held true during the very important last quarter of the year. “Apple maintained the number 1 position with 16.2 million devices shipped in 4Q18, 10.4 million of which were Apple Watches,” said IDC. “The Series 4 has been off to a very strong start and IDC anticipates this to continue as more healthcare organizations and consumers adopt the latest device. The remainder of Apple’s shipments were comprised of AirPods and Beats headphones in the ear-worn category.”
This company’s total wearable shipments were up 21.5 percent in Q4.
AirPods 2 could launch as early as the end of this month, but the next generation of Apple Watch isn’t expected until this fall.
Top wearable competitors
The number two spot was held by Xiaomi with 23.3 million smartwatches and ear-worn smart devices shipped last year thanks to strong sales in its home country of China.
The situation is more complicated with Fitbit. It was in third place for all of 2018 but in fourth place in the final quarter of the year. “The company’s outlook remains strong as investments in the healthcare segment continue to pay off,” remarked IDC. It shipped 13.8 million units last year.
Huawei was in fourth place in the global wearables market last year, but beat Fitbit during the holiday shopping season. In Q4, it enjoyed “a staggering 248.5% growth in the wearables market since many of the Huawei and Honor phones were bundled with wearables.“ Its 2018 total was 11.3 million devices.
Samsung was in fifth place in both Q4 and all of 2018 partially thanks to bundling wearables with smartphones.
The whole wearables market grew 27.5 percent last year. “Much of this growth was attributed to the growing number of ear-worn devices as they captured almost a quarter of the market during the year,” according to IDC.
