Apple Dominates Smart Watch Market in First Half of 2020 Thanks to Series 5 Demand

The Apple Watch accounted for 51.4 percent of worldwide smart watch market revenue brought in during the first half of 2020, according to new data shared today by Counterpoint Research.

Apple has dominated the smart watch market for years now, and the first half of 2020 is no exception. Other smart watch vendors didn't even come close to Apple's smart watch shipment revenue share, with Garmin devices responsible for 9.4 percent of revenue and Huawei devices responsible for 8.3 percent.

Total global smart watch shipments grew 20 percent year over year even amid the pandemic, with Apple's own shipments growing 22 percent. In total, close to 42 million smart watches were shipped in the first half of 2020.

By shipment volume, the Apple Watch Series 5 was the best selling smart watch worldwide in the first half of 2020, followed by the more affordable Apple Watch Series 3. The Huawei Watch GT2 and the Galaxy Watch Active 2 were the number three and four best selling watches, respectively.

"Apple continued to dominate the smartwatch market both in volume and value. Apple captured a record half of the market in terms of revenue due to strong demand for the Apple Watch S5 models. In terms of shipment volumes, Apple Watch grew 22% globally with Europe and North America being the fastest growing markets in the first half of 2020."

Counterpoint Research expects that fall detection and SPO2 will be two key features that will see mass adoption in future smart watch models. Apple has already implemented fall detection, and rumors have suggested that blood oxygen monitoring could be a feature included in the Apple Watch Series 6.

Blood oxygen monitoring would allow the Apple Watch to measure the amount of oxygen in the blood, as this reading can be helpful to know whether to seek immediate medical attention.