Global smart wearable shipments recorded a 55.2% year-over-year growth in the first quarter of 2019, reaching nearly 50 million units, according to IDC.
Apple, Xiaomi, Huawei, Samsung, and Fitbit are the top five smart wearable producers, together taking nearly 64% market share in past quarter, up from 55.2% in the same period last year.
While Apple remained the biggest player in the industry with 25.8% of worldwide smart wearable business and saw a 49.5% year-on-year growth in the past quarter, Huawei and Samsung recorded the most significant growth in the first quarter of 2019.
Huawei’s quarterly shipments shot up from 1.3 million units in the first quarter of 2018 to 5 million in the past quarter, recording a whopping 282.2% increase.
Samsung achieved 151.6% quarterly growth with its shipments going up from 1.7 million in the first three months of 2018 to 4.3 million.
However, as Huawei’s surge in market share was linked to the success of its smartphones, IDC predicted “the outlook for the wearables side of the business will also remain in flux” due to uncertainty related to a US ban.
