Wearables shipments worldwide market share 2014-2021, by vendor

The wearable device industry is dominated by Apple, Xiaomi, Samsung, and Huawei. In 2021, Apple was the leading wearables vendor, occupying 30.3 percent of the market. Prior to Apple becoming the leading wearable devices vendor in 2017, Fitbit was the market leader with market shares close to 40 percent.

Hearables and smartwatches driving the growth of wearables

    Within the space of a decade, worldwide unit shipments of wearable devices are forecast to grow dramatically. Hearables and smartwatches are forecast to be the largest wearable device categories in the next few years, with the hearables market growing much faster than smartwatches. Particularly, the growth of the hearables market has been supported by high levels of product innovation, with high-quality microphones and speakers embedded within the devices that allow users to interact with virtual assistants such as Apple’s Siri and the Google Assistant.

Medical wearables and smart glasses

   Wearables are used in other contexts as well, such as medicine and immersive experiences. Particularly, shipments of medical wearable sensors and devices are forecast to increase in the coming years, with around 160 million units expected to be shipped by 2024. North America is a leading region in the medical wearables market, followed by Europe with around 23 percent of the market share. Moreover, augmented reality (AR) glasses are gaining in popularity both for consumers and enterprises, with around 3.9 million units unit sales expected in 2024.