Figures from telecom analysts CCS Insight show that fewer than 14 million tablets will be sold in the UK this year. That’s a drop of 3 million devices from last year’s total.
This fall comes after two years of dramatic growth.
Two years ago, just 6% of the UK population owned a tablet. Today, more than 43% of the population has a tablet - and that figure is expected to almost double by 2017, when annual sales hit 20 million. However, there’s expected to be a slowing down in tablet sales for the next two years.
Marina Koytcheva, director of forecasting at CCS Insight, said “It's only natural that we will now see a cooling off in tablet sales for the next couple of years. The next big wave of growth will come in two years when consumers who bought their first tablets in 2012 and 2013 start replacing them. We expect many of those who bought cheap tablets will upgrade to more expensive products next time around as they grow frustrated by the limitations of what the low-end tablets can do.”
The company expects global tablet sales to increase 28% year-on-year to 256 million units in 2014. It’s a notably lower rate than 2013, when tablet sales increased by 68% to 201 million worldwide.