Holiday Quarter Woes Contribute to a Full-Year Decline in Shipments of Wearable Devices, According to IDC Tracker
NEEDHAM, Mass., March 7, 2023 – Global shipments of wearable devices declined 18.9% year over year in the fourth quarter of 2022 (4Q22) to 138.7 million units, according to new data from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Wearable Device Tracker. Shipments for the full year 2022 were down 7.7% compared to 2021, marking the first year of decline for the category due to challenging macroeconomic conditions and difficult comparisons to the strong results of 2021. Despite the downturn, overall shipments of 492.1 million units in 2022 were well above 2020 and 2019 levels.
Every geographic region except Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan and China) (APeJC) and the Middle East and Africa (MEA) experienced a year-over-year decline in wearable shipments for the full year 2022. APeJC and MEA, like many emerging markets within the regions, remain underpenetrated and have yet to face the extreme levels of inflation that other markets have observed.
Amongst the various product types, smartwatches grew 9.4% during 2022, reaching an all-time high of 148.6 million units with Apple in the lead. Huawei and Samsung captured the second and third positions in the smartwatch sub-market while India's Nexxbase and Fire-Boltt rounded out the global top 5 thanks to their value-oriented products sold within India. Hearables, the largest category of wearables, declined almost 10% as 2021 provided tough year-over-year comparisons while wrist bands, the third largest category, also continued to see shipments decline due to competition from smartwatches.
"Given the tough economic environment consumer demand has understandably slowed," said Jitesh Ubrani, research manager for IDC Mobility and Consumer Device Trackers. "Having lower cost options available as part of their portfolio is one way vendors can help spur some demand in the coming quarters. Beyond that, trade-in offers, financing options, and subscription services will also play a key role in maintaining profitability while also bringing value to consumers."
“Although the market will contract in 2022, this is only temporary,” said Ramon T. Llamas, research director with IDC’s Wearables team “The market fundamentals are sound with healthy replacement rates, continued market penetration, and greater availability of more devices at different feature sets and price points in the years to come. But given the number of brands and devices, differentiation will become hard to come by. This puts the onus on vendors to develop best-in-market devices and solutions to attract and retain customers.”
"The past two years saw heady growth for the worldwide wearables market and the 2022 decline is what happens once demand has been satiated," said Ramon T. Llamas, research director, Mobile Devices and AR/VR at IDC. "The silver lining is that users will eventually replace their devices and that will put the market back on track for growth. This is where companies with a broad selection of devices with varying feature sets, price points, and an ecosystem built around them will be rewarded once growth returns."
[2023-Mar] Worldwide Wearables Forecast by Product
Data table for "[2023-Mar] Worldwide Wearables Forecast by Product" chart
Year
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
2027
Clothing
505,272
728,900
849,348
985,099
1,097,815
1,429,785
Earwear
306,785,680
324,984,001
352,544,901
373,994,726
391,557,393
404,018,043
Glasses
440,866
653,556
698,890
830,346
955,073
1,066,218
Modular
23,149
35,305
33,204
33,700
36,457
38,999
Other
714,839
739,707
753,893
829,389
888,781
923,804
Smartwatch
148,589,505
162,181,005
177,939,751
189,840,657
198,610,489
205,276,957
Wrist Band
35,047,449
33,849,766
33,601,686
33,102,129
32,442,844
31,728,492
Top 5 Wearable Devices by Product, Shipment Volume, Market Share, and Year-Over-Year Growth, 2022 (shipments in millions)