• by Chuck Martin , June 19, 2018

By the end of this year, 125 million wearable devices will ship, according to the International Data Corporation’s latest quarterly wearable device tracking report.

Smartwatches are leading and will account for 45% of all wearables shipped by the end of 2022, up from 35% this year, with Apple continuing its market lead. The overall growth rate of wearables is up 8% from last year, slightly slower than the 10% growth rate in 2017.

"The shift in consumer preferences towards smartwatches has been in full swing these past few quarters and we expect that to continue in the coming years," stated Jitesh Ubrani, senior research analyst for IDC. "While Apple will undoubtedly lead in this category, what bears watching is how Google and its partners move forward. WearOS (formerly Android Wear) has been somewhat of a laggard recently and despite expected changes to the OS and the release of new silicon, we anticipate Android-based watches to be WearOS' closest competitor due to the high amount of customization available to vendors and the lack of Google services in China."

By market share, wristbands will decrease from 36% this year to 23% in 2022, according to IDC. The market share of basic watches, primarily sport watches, children’s watches and hybrid watches, will decline from 24% this year to 20% in four years.