Apple’s Q4 2019 HomePod sales were way up, shipping an estimated 2.6 million smart speakers. However, that was only good enough to take a 4.7% share of the market.
New estimates published today by Strategy Analytics show Apple was the number six worldwide smart speaker vendor during Q4, coming in behind Amazon, Google, Baidu, Alibaba, and Xiaomi.
Amazon continued to lead the market during Q4 2019, shipping an estimated 15.8 million speakers for 28.3 percent market share. Google came in second with 13.9 million speakers shipped and 24.9 percent market share, followed by Chinese companies Baidu, Alibaba, and Xiaomi.
Apple shipped one million more HomePods in Q4 2019 than it did a year ago, when it shipped 1.6 million, for an impressive 65% growth. (Still, when you start as low as Apple did, it’s easy to show “impressive growth.”)
The overall smart speaker market was up 44.7% with 55.7 million total shipments. That was up from the 38.5 million the industry shipped in Q4 2018.
Strategy Analytics expects 2020 to be another record year for smart speaker sales despite the disruption to supply and demand caused by the coronavirus.
It could be another thin year for Apple, HomePod sales-wise though, as the report shows consumers are bargain hunters when it comes to smart speakers.
“Consumer appetite for smart speakers remained undimmed during the all-important Q4 period as newly launched devices with improved feature sets and audio performance helped drive record quarterly shipments. Consumers across the world were once again enticed by scarcely believable deals from leading brands such as Google, Amazon, Baidu and Alibaba, while Google in particular stepped up its giveaway promotional activity in partnership with brands such as YouTube and Spotify.”
Apple’s HomePod is priced at $299 in the United States and is available only in a limited number of countries.