Apple’s true wireless audio devices set new shipment records: Canalys

With smartphones becoming ubiquitous, many users are turning to these personal audio devices. Further data from Canalys shows that for every 100 smartphones shipped in the quarter, there are 13 wearable bands and 27 smart personal audio devices being shipped.

“The rising importance of streaming content, and the rapid uptake in a new form of social media including short videos, resulted in profound changes in mobile users’ audio consumption and these changes will accelerate in the next five years while technology advancements like machine learning and smart assistants will bring more radical innovations in areas such as audio content discovery and ambient computing,” Nicole Peng, VP of Mobility at Canalys commented on the trend.

Apple continues to dominate in the true wireless segment, well ahead of rivals like Xiaomi and Samsung. (Image source: Canalys)

In the personal audio devices, it is the TWS segment that dominates with a 183 per cent annual growth in the quarter. Further, these overtook wireless earphones and wireless headphones to become the largest category in this segment.

Apple remains the leader in the true wireless segment with a whopping 18.2 million units shipped. Xiaomi was number two in this segment with 7 per cent market share, while Samsung was number three with 6 per cent market share. In China, Xiaomi sells Redmi AirDots, which are similar to the AirPods. Samsung its own Galaxy Buds, which compete with Apple.

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“Apple is in clear leadership position and not only on the chipset technology front. The seamless integration with iPhone, unique sizing and noise cancelling features providing top of the class user experience, is where other smartphone vendors such as Samsung, Huawei and Xiaomi are aiming their TWS devices. In the short-term, smart personal audio devices are seen as the best up-selling opportunities for smartphone vendors, compared with wearables and smart home devices,” Nicole added.

The true wireless category had the highest growth among all smart personal audio devices. (Image source: Canalys)

In the wireless earphone market, JBL was the leader, followed by Sony and SkullCandy. In wireless headphones, JBL was on top as well followed by Sony and Bose. However, analysts at Canalys warn that traditional audio players can no longer afford to overlook the TWS category.

“Demand for high-fidelity audio will continue to grow and traditional audio players must not underestimate the importance of the TWS category. The lack of control over any connected smart devices is the audio players’ biggest weakness. Audio players must come up with an industry standard enabling better integration with smartphones, while allowing developers to tap into the audio features to create new use cases to avoid obsoletion,” Jason Low, Canalys Senior Analyst said.