In the Q1, 2023 earnings report, Apple announced that it has reached an active install base was over 2 billion active devices, a milestone achievement.
Now, Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) latest analysis of the ownership patterns across Apple devices revealed that Mac is the tech giant’s least popular out of its four major products: iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and Mac.
The transition from Intel processor to Apple Silicon in 2020 can be viewed as the renaissance of Macs. M series chips have brought great performance along with incredible power efficiency to the upgraded computers. Furthermore, it also enabled the tech company to offer more advanced features on macOS like Freeform, console games, and others.
Apple’s VP of Platform Architecture and Hardware Technologies, Tim Millet said that “the opportunity we had with M1 the way I looked at it, it was about resetting the baseline.”
50% of Apple users own a Mac, while 88% own an iPhone
Although Apple Silicon has boosted Mac sales significantly, it is still the least-owned Apple device. The report lists the following percentage for each product owned by Apple customers:
- iPhone owned by 88% of customers
- iPad owned by 73% of customers
- Apple Watch owned by 58% of customers
- Mac computers owned by 50% of customers
The numbers might not be good for Mac, but overall reflect a very strong position of Apple in the market. CIRP accredits the company’s success to its powerful ecosystem with seamless integration between hardware and software.
As we think about the broad scope of Apple products, including which retailers sell which ones, we also analyze ownership patterns across devices. Part of the Apple appeal is the power of the ecosystem. The various hardware offerings work well together. iMessage crosses seamlessly between phones and computers. iCloud storage provides backup and file sharing across devices. Apple Music is easily accessible on all devices.
Maybe as the company continues to launch new computers powered by its advanced silicon, the ownership base of Macs will improve. Apple is offering users a variety of high-performance computers at various price points to cater to a wider customer base like the Mac mini (M2 and M2 Pro) starts from $599, and M1 MacBook Air starts from $999.
