Apple AirPods have cornered 26 percent of the wireless headphone market in the US

Apple’s AirPods have already cornered 26 percent of the wireless headphone market for themselves in the US. Apple’s own Beats brand and competitors Jaybird and Plantronics saw a marked decrease in market share in the months following the AirPods’ release. Together with Beats, which currently commands a market share of over 16 percent, Apple commands over 40 percent of the wireless headphone market. The data, compiled by analytics firm Slice Intelligence, was sourced from over 4.4 million online shoppers. The AirPods went on sale on 13 December and since then, has also boosted wireless headphone sales to over 75 percent of the overall headphone market. The report also concludes that a whopping eighty-five percent of shoppers who bought the AirPods were male, and that they were, on average, younger than the average female shopper. Apple’s AirPods retail for $159 (around Rs 10,800) in the US and for Rs 15,000 in India. The AirPods are a unique design as far as wireless earphones go. They feature an embedded W1 control chip that ensures easy pairing and syncing of audio as well as voice accelerometers to better detect voice input. Siri functionality is also integrated into the design. That said, the AirPods have also been bashed left and right for their design, high price and lack of proper volume controls. This doesn’t seem to have stopped anyone from buying the AirPods, however.