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Last year was an interesting one, with promises of cars taking flight and phones degrading on purpose (but pay Apple a few more dollars and that’ll do the trick). Was Apple the dominant product we all think it was, or did 2017 end up being Amazon’s year? Let’s take a look at the year’s top selling technologies…
As you probably guessed, Apple won the top spot as the best-selling tech product provider of 2017, taking up two slots in the top five. Unsurprisingly, the iPhone was the best selling tech of 2017, with combined sales of all models outshining all other products in the top five combined.
The Apple Watch came in 4th place, with overall sales of 20 million units.
iPhone sales for the year were expected to approach 223 million units, an increase of 12 million over 2016’s sales, yet down from its 2015 record of 230 million iPhones sold.
Expectations for 2018 for Apple see continued expansion for the Apple Watch, and a quiet explosion in iPhone sales, driven by product updates and price reductions. A planned spring upgrade for the SE model precedes rollouts of new models in the fall, and an expected cut in price on models without edge-to-edge display serving as a driver for up to 350 million upgrades by users.
Coming in at second place was Samsung, with 33 million units sold of its Galaxy S8 and Note 8 in 2017. As this best seller list focuses on premium phones, other offerings from the Samsung family, such as the A-series and J-series, which don’t meet that standard, aren’t included in the overall units moved. Neither is the Galaxy Note 7, a combination phone/tablet released last year, but suffered from a global recall.
Amazon’s Echo Dot connected speaker came in third place, with 24 million units sold. In the weeks leading to the holidays, Amazon made the decision to slash the price of the Echo Dot from $49.99 to $29.99, which remains its price point to date—a decision which allowed holiday shoppers flexibility to fall in love with the Echo Dot and add it to their shopping lists in large quantity.
Rounding out the top five is the only video-game entry on this year’s list, the Nintendo Switch, which sold 15 million units. With a suggested manufacturers retail price of $299.99, the Switch benefited from a marketing campaign that began with the company’s first ever ad during Super Bowl LI. The ad campaign, which continued with commercials in such diverse places as the 2017 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament, the 2017 Kids’ Choice Awards, and on programming blocks for Nickelodeon, Adult Swim, and Comedy Central, highlighted the multiple ways that gamers could use the hardware, at home and on the go, leading to higher than expected sales for the launch.
