Slice Intelligence, which monitors purchase receipts in the email inboxes of a panel of two million online shoppers, has published a chart showing that the majority of Apple Watch orders were placed on the first day of pre-orders, and have since fallen to far smaller numbers than some analysts have predicted.
Quartz tech editor Dan Frommer notes that while the company’s data shows that almost 1.5 million U.S. orders were placed on day one (up from its initial estimate of one million), subsequent orders have typically been running at under 30,000 per day – compared to the 100,000 per day globally needed to meet some predictions …
It could even be said that Apple Watch sales fell dramatically after the first hour, a separate chart posted by the company on its own website showing that 800,000 orders – more than half of the first day’s total – were placed within an hour of online presales opening.
KGI significantly lowered its own sales forecast a couple of days ago, cutting its estimates by 20-30% to 5-6 million units in the third quarter. Slice did not reveal model breakdowns, but our own unscientific poll of more than 17,000 readers showed the Sport in Space Gray to be the most popular model, accounting for 40% of sales, followed by the Apple Watch in silver, the Sport in silver and the Apple Watch in Space Black.
There are, though, a number of things to note here. First, Slice’s data represents U.S. sales only, while the watch is on sale in eight other countries: the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong and Japan.
Second, as Frommer notes, Apple appears to have sold more than two million Apple Watches in one country in less than a month, compared to several months to sell as many iPhones and more than two years to sell two million units of the product that changed Apple’s fortunes: the iPod. This is a successful product launch by any standard.
Also likely significant is the fact that you can’t yet walk into an Apple retail store and buy a watch. While the type of tech enthusiasts who were waiting impatiently for Apple to release the watch may have been happy to order online, sight unseen, that isn’t going to be true of most ordinary people. And this product, more than any other that Apple has ever made, has been targeted at the mass market, with coverage in fashion magazines and product placement with celebrities.
But Apple, more than most companies, sees its performance judged not by any rational measure of success, but by comparison with sometimes hyped expectations. Don’t be surprised to read a few ‘Apple is doomed’ posts based on these numbers …
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It’s not really doomed is it. No official figures announced yet and this data is a third party guide based on Day 1 sales of the watch going on sale in the U.S only.
The big test will be the shop launch, the experience of those people who aren’t Apple fans who just pop into the store, try it on and want to buy it.
At the moment, those people are walking away feeling frustrated and annoyed with Apple, as it appears to them a bit imperious and pretentious rather than cool and exclusive. Maybe even buying a FitBit, or, (god forbid I say this) a Microsoft band!
No official numbers is telling. If they were good, they’d announce them.
So then the end result can only be that Apple must be doomed. DOOOOOOOMED.
This is a ridiculous piece of non-news. The combination of long delivery times for those who ordered sight-unseen combined with the promise of in-store availability in the not-too-distant future is obviously causing people to wait. This doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot of pent-up demand.
Clearly, Apple is doomed. They bet their entire fortune on this product, and without selling at least 50 billion units in the first month, they’ll never be able to make their mortgage payment on the new HQ. I wouldn’t be surprised if all construction stopped by the end of next week. Man, their profit margins are so slim these days that any disruption in supply kills their quarterly reports. Oh wait, we’re talking about Apple. I thought this was a Sony post.
Sony RICH!
40 % of the sold smartphones have 2 optics Sony…
Apple ——-> Sony Equipment ;-)
Troll..
You’re a troll. Everything you just stated is pure nonsense, with no factual basis. STFU.
Slice intelligence has 2 million users to monitor, not the entire globe of possible buyers – and if the data shown are correct, 75% of their customers bought an Apple Watch.
I’d say, not bad.
That’s not how it works. These are projections obviously.
That’s just it, these are not projections, its historical data and draws inferences to world demand while charting US demand on a scale that is clearly amateurish.
@ssanook they are projections, they didn’t measure all the sales, it’s even written on the title of the graph…
“Don’t be surprised to read a few ‘Apple is doomed’ posts based on these numbers…”
There are only 3 certainties in life: death, taxes and Apple is doomed.
It’s hard to sell something to somebody when they haven’t seen it, and it won’t ship for two months. As soon as they’re in stores, they’re going to fly off the shelves.
Only articles about Apple’s impending doom get any traction or comments so…
87.1% of all statistics are made up.
LOL…Penn and Teller :P
They are selling it only in a very few countries and with large delivery date… and this does not encourage people to buy…. Now days people wants to buy it NOW.
The big numbers of sales will appear when they start to sell them all over the world… I mean in countries like … Portugal :)
From what I see Apple is selling 250.000 watches every ten days or so in the US alone. That is huge.
Yeah, especially considering that in 2014 the total number of all of Android Wear smart watches was under 1 million for the whole year. All this proves is two things:
1) The Apple Watch is by far the most successful smart watch to date.
2) Apple iPhone users are far more likely to adopt new technology than Android users. (but we already knew this from all the old online usage charts)
Out performing a failure doesnt make you a success.
“which monitors purchase receipts in the email inboxes of a panel of two million online shoppers”
Okay….sooooo, they are only monitoring 2 million inboxes and from that we should deduce sales have fallen to tiny numbers? How in the world does this make any sense at all? So out of those 2 million, X bought the Watch and the rest won’t. That’s all I get from this. What about the other 100 million that have compatible iPhones out there?? LOL
Still, for argument sake, even if this was any sort of reasonable statistic, which it’s not since the sample is so finite, it still shows many thousands selling per day. Pretty good I’d say for something no one needs and already far beyond what any other smart watch has ever sold.
I’d say 2000000 is a damn nice sample size.
The real question is, is it a representative sample? Serious selection bias issues to be resolved here.
I’m not surprised by this at all — what do you expect when neither Apple nor ANY of their retail partners, whether it be online or in store, have any product to ship? The AW product launch in general has been a gigantic fuster cluck. If it was actually available on April 24th like they said it was going to be, I have to think that this chart would be completely different…
Angry, butthurt, defensive Apple fan replies in 3… 2… 1
Too late, they started before your reply.
They have their opinion you may agree or disagree and that is your personal opinion too. Respect what matters.
I believe the numbers to be close to accurate. I ordered mine in the wee hours of 4/10/15, but knew exactly what I was buying, and why I was buying it. Others possibly, were buying without such well defined, and detailed aspirations. I believe that as a platform Smart Watches have a way to go before convincing the general public of their viability and usefulness. And, let’s face it…. Hard to sell something people can’t see and touch, and Apple’s Watch is MIA in the retail channels. So maybe, if Apple can actually get product in the hands of customers the numbers and awareness will start to tick up, actually I’m quite certain of this, as this is one device that Is as Tim said…. very personal, and must be seen, touched, and used personally to really GET IT!
No matter how many times I get beat up here for saying it, this is turning into a disaster.
I believe I can look at this from a neutral stance, as I don’t consider myself a fan of Apple. Yes, I own a MBP 13″, iPhone 6, iPad Air 2, and an Apple Watch Sport (since launch day). Some may have laughed at that comment, but I have no problem buying an Android phone if I consider it the best for me. I’ve owned the HTC One M8 and Galaxy S3. I have no problem buying a Samsung tablet. I have, and can still, switch between the ecosystems at will.
With all of that being said, yes, I look at this as a disaster in terms of leaving a bad taste in non-Apple fan’s mouths. An Apple fan will see Apple as doing no wrong, so I don’t pay much attention to what they have to say. They will always be fans no matter what. You can see that all over this site and specifically in this article’s comment section.
The opinions I really pay attention to are those who seem like they were/are on the fence about buying the Apple Watch and those who might be Android or Windows users and are considering joining the Apple ecosystem by getting an iPhone 6, iPhone 6 and Watch, iPad, or MBP. When they say they are turned off and dissapointed by this Watch launch then it actually means something and matters. I see that as Apple missing an opportunity to add to it’s already-large treasure chest.
I am the only person I know that has an Apple Watch on wrist. That’s sad. I work in a major city, know a lot of people, and run across a lot of different people every day. Apple should’ve waited until all the production issues were fixed to release the Watch properly. Even if that meant postponing the launch, they should’ve done so. I know a few people who ordered on 04.10.15 and are STILL waiting on their watch. It’s 05.22.15. I have read plenty of comments on this site about people who are waiting. If you don’t consider that a disaster then I don’t know what is.
Maybe I should’ve said Fan boy. I’m not a fan boy, but I do like some of Apple’s products, as I like some Samsung and HTC products.
You the only one to have one on your wrist cause you can’t get the Damn thing. You had to stay up till 3am on the east coast to get one and then most still didn’t get one. Final judgement will be made when you can walk into a store or order one online and get it immediately, as others have said..
Who is Slice Analytics and why should we trust their data?
Ties in quite nicely to yesterdays post about how demand has died and estimates are being chopped in half, so now this logic is coming from multiple sources. I’d say it is likely reality.
Wait until WWDC keynote before you believe the analysts. Tim will comment on sales for sure as developers want to code for a successful product.
Tim Cook will BS the numbers with positive spin, comparison tables to Android Watches and such. The fact is the watch isnt selling at levels Apple needs. I dont need an analyst or Tim Cook to explain it. I can walk into any building anywhere and be LUCKY to see ONE person in an Apple Watch. That means its failing.
Pretty much every other company on earth would love to be “doomed” like Apple.
Most people I’ve spoken to who want an Apple Watch are simply waiting until they can walk into the Appel Store and get one. They are waiting for the same buying experience they’ve had with every other Apple product. When that can happen, the charts will show a spike in sales.
The Apple Watch will never be like the iPhone where it defines the company. After a week of using mine, the Apple Watch is a “like” object, not a “love” object like the iPhone. I might recommend it to friends into tech, but I wouldn’t recommend it to my parents (unlike the iPhone). It takes some time to figure out and you need to put a little effort into learning about the features. The Apple Watch will be the most successful smartwatch but I am not sure smartwatches are ready to take over the world just yet. Clearly the average person is going to want to try this on, but at the same time I think the smartwatch segment is going to be limited (in the US) until you can pay with NFC everywhere. That to me is the killer app that drives usage to the masses.
There’s no availability, even for online purchases. Does anyone really think sales would continue to be strong when customers aren’t going to get the product for 2-3 months?
I will buy one the moment they stop fucking around and put it on a goddamn shelf. And I’m sure there are many others like me on this. >_>
This would be more impressive if the numbers weren’t estimates based on emailed receipts to a selected panel of shoppers. I’ll wait for Apple’s sales report at the end of the quarter, thank you very much. I prefer to work with, you know, actual data.
Apple isn’t reporting Watch sales.
Let’s face the facts, the Apple Watch is not a new innovation and it doesn’t do anything
a smartphone can’t. Watches come in endless varieties and price points and the Apple
watch only has one style hardware interface which in is general boring. Apple makes an
attempt to make their watch interface less boring by offering you different watch faces
from their program. They also offer a variety of watch bands to try and make up for such
a mundane watch that ranges from $350 to over 15K. Can Apple make a killing from offering
such a simplistic unimaginative watch? My guess is Yes, but probably for one year. I am one of
Apples greatest supporters but they miss the mark on this on by a mile.
“it doesn’t do anything a smartphone can’t”
false. A smartphone can’t constantly track your heart rate throughout a workout.
Even based on estimates from this small panel, 30,000 units PER DAY doesn’t seem too bad to me. How many Moto 360s are being sold per day or Galaxy Gear Whatevers? No one outside of Apple knows what the production constraints are and no one outside of Apple knows what they expected to sell. I’m sure they’d like to sell more, but I bet they’re OK with how sales are going so far. They take a long term view.