UPDATED 02:00 EDT / JULY 22 2015

NEWS

Apple mum on Apple Watch sales, but gives us enough to guess

Apple on Tuesday announced its third quarter earnings and, as always, broke out sales for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. While Apple was happy to highlight record sales for iPhone and Mac, the company did not reveal Apple Watch sales numbers – no surprise, since it warned that it wouldn’t report on Apple Watch as its own product category.

Instead, Apple Watch is grouped under “other products” along with Apple TV, iPod, Beats Electronics, and accessories.

Q3 Apple Watch revenue

Comparing third quarter results for the “other products” category to the previous quarter, we can guess at Apple Watch’s performance. Third quarter revenue for “other products’ was 2.6 billion, up 56 percent –or $952 million – from the second quarter, which did not include Apple Watch.

It is not possible to attribute the 56 percent growth solely to Apple Watch sales as other products in the category may have grown during the quarter. However, comments made by Apple CEO Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri suggest Apple Watch accounted for more than that growth number.

During the company’s earnings call with analysts, Cook, pointing out declining iPod and accessory sales, cautioning that it would not be accurate to simply look at the sequential change for the category and assume that is Apple Watch revenue.

On the earnings call alongside Cook, Maestri said that the Apple Watch accounted for “well over 100 percent of the growth” of the “other products” category, offsetting the iPod and accessories decline.

Given the numbers and Cook and Maestri’s comments, third quarter revenue for Apple Watch was likely somewhere north of $1 billion, with some publications estimating it at $1.4 billion.

Q3 Apple Watch unit sales

Given the Apple Watch’s price range –$349 at the low-end up to $17,000 on the high-end – it’s impossible to calculate how many units Apple sold based on estimated revenue.

In an interview with The New York Times, Maestri said, “the watch’s sales in its first nine weeks exceeded those of the iPhone and iPad in their first nine weeks of availability.” According to Apple, the iPad sold 3 million units in the first 11 weeks of availability – hinting at around 2.5 million Apple Watches sold.

On the earnings call, Cook reiterated that Apple Watch exceeded Apple’s expectations and revealed that June sales were higher than April and May – making it clear that recent reports of slowing demand for the Watch are wrong.

Image credit: Shinya Suzuki via Flickr

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