Survey: Smart Speakers Quickly Becoming Ubiquitous In American Households

Smart speakers have become integral to U.S. households in a big way.

The adoption rate of the devices increased from 21.5 percent in 2017 to 41 percent in 2018, TechCrunch reported, citing RBC Capital Markets.

Smart speakers had a great holiday quarter, according to new research by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, or CIRP.

CIPR based its findings on a survey of 500 U.S. owners of smart speakers that was carried out Jan. 1-11.

The study showed that the U.S. installed base of smart speaker devices nearly doubled year-over-year from 36 million units in the fourth quarter of 2017 to 66 million units in the fourth quarter of 2018. The most recent December quarter numbers represent roughly 25-percent sequential growth from the third quarter of 2018.

"Holiday shoppers helped the smart speaker market take off again," said Josh Lowitz, CIRP partner and co-founder.

Growth in Alexa-enabled devices and Google Home devices were primarily behind the spurt in the adoption rate, according to TechCrunch.

Echo At Pole Position

Early mover Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN rules the roost, with CIRP's survey pointing to a 70-percent market share for its Echo device in the U.S. market.

Source: CIRP

Alphabet Inc GOOGL GOOG's Google Home is a distant second with a 24-percent share, followed by Apple Inc. AAPL's HomePod, with a 6-percent share.

Multiple Unit Ownership On The Rise

The percentage of consumers with more than one smart speaker more than doubled in the December quarter, according to the CIRP survey. The percentage increased from 18 percent in the fourth quarter of 2017 to 35 percent in the fourth quarter 2018.

Amazon and Google seem to have succeeded in persuading consumers to use smart speakers in multiple rooms, driving more active usage of the platform, CIRP said.

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The Top Reason Some Won't Buy A Smart Speaker: Price, Not Privacy

Photo courtesy of Apple.