Amazon’s Fire TV stick is leading the pack of newly popular streaming TV devices, as more people look for simple and convenient ways of accessing smart TV features, according to new data.
A new study from 1010data’s Ecom Insights panel tracked millions of online shoppers in the US to monitor the take up of these relatively new devices.
Streaming sticks attach to a modern TV’s USB port, with many people using them for Netflix, YouTube, HBO Go, Pandora, playing games and casting their mobile screen to view content more easily and socially.
The study found that across all eCommerce activity (across all product categories) at 100 online merchants, the top two selling items by units sold were the Amazon Fire TV Stick and the Google Chromecast.
In total, the two sticks sold a combined 4.8 million units in the US.
For the first seven months of 2015, Amazon, led the charge with 49% of dollar sales with its $39 Fire TV Stick. Google, which created the category with its $35 Chromecast, came in second place with 41% of the market. Roku, which was an early innovator in streaming, was in third place with 10% of the market.
Roku, it should be noted, has the most expensive streaming stick at $50.
On Prime Day (July 15), Amazon dropped the price of its stick to $24 and, as a result, the company accounted for 64 per cent of the dollar share in the market in July (up 14 percentage points over June).
Analyzing total unit sales, Google has performed better than Amazon during this year. The Chromecast accounted for 47% of stick sales compared to 45% for Amazon and 8% for Roku.
The vast majority of all the sales of streaming sticks occurred from Amazon. Close to 98% of Fire TV Sticks, 88% of the Chromecasts and 85% of the Roku’s were sold through Amazon.com (note: the Google Store wasn’t included in the study).
Methodology
1010data’s Ecom Insights panel consists of millions of online shoppers in the U.S. who allow 1010data to anonymously track their online behavior for market research purposes, including e-commerce activity.
1010data applies advanced, proprietary statistical modeling, machine learning, and data science techniques to ensure that its panel is representative of the Internet Browsing Population in the U.S. and suitable to extrapolate observations to the broader population.
Retailers measured include the top 100 online mass retailers in the United States that – according to 1010data’s estimates – make up over 95% of hard line goods ordered online Total Spent. In this analysis the Google Store was not included.