AppleInsider Staff
Shipments of 9.7-inch tablets like Apple's full-size iPad "collapsed" in January, setting the stage for the iPad mini to be the market leader in 2013.
In a post to its official blog on Thursday, NPD DisplaySearch revealed it has heard that Apple may currently be planning to ship 55 million iPad minis and 33 million iPads this year. That's a major change from the company's apparent plans in December, when Apple had expected to ship 40 million iPad minis and 60 million full-size iPads this year.
If Apple were to sell 88 million iPads this year, it would be a significant increase from 2012, when the company sold 58.31 million iPads.
Apple apparently changed course on its 2013 plans after shipments of 9.7-inch tablets "collapsed," falling from 7.4 million in December to 1.3 million in January. Meanwhile, shipments of 7-inch tablets, like Google's Nexus 7, and 7.9-inch tablets, like the iPad mini, grew from 12 million to 14 million.
As Apple has shifted its approach, competitors are also said to be preferring to build tablets in the 7-to-9-inch range. "White box" companies based in China also reportedly prefer tablets with smaller screen sizes.
NPD DisplaySearch forecasts that tablet PC shipments will reach 254 million in 2013, up from 160 million in 2012. Of those, tablets in the size range of 5 inches to 8.9 inches will account for 136 million units, while those from 9 to 10 inches will reach 118 million units.
Amber Neely
Andrew Orr
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
Chip Loder
34 Comments
Um if larger iPad display sales "collapsed" I'd chalk it up to people sweating what was the normal refresh's expected this time of year for the past three.. I've got the iPad 3 my wife the mini - she's hooked solid on it.. Am loving games like Temple Run 2 on mine.. Amazing ..
The crazy logic of making the phones larger and the tablets smaller. The mini however is the perfect tablet size in my mind. If it has a retina screen this year, it could very well sell every shipped 55 million.
Npd forgets that a new lighter thinner smaller ipad 9.7 is right around the corner! The is a momentery skew till the new ipad comes out. Also their numbers dont add up. Ipad had aprox 50% market share of thablets in 2012... Yet npd numbers indicate 35% market share. And project 30% for 2013. Those are inconsitant with other data out there!
Maybe the full-size iPad's weight and bulk compared to the Mini put people off?
I don't remember apple saying how many iPads the expected to sell in 2013. That's because they did not. It's analyst and these "research" groups that have 0 clue what apple is upto