Worldwide wearable devices sales to grow 18.4% in 2016

Nearly 274.6 million wearable electronic devices will be sold worldwide in 2016 - an increase of 18.4% from 232.0 million units in 2015 - generating revenue of $28.7 billion, according to the world`s leading information technology research company Gartner.

Of the total revenue generated, $11.5 billion will be from smart watches, the company said in its report "Forecast: Wearable Electronic Devices, Worldwide, 2016."

"From 2015 through 2017, smart watch adoption will have 48 %growth largely due to Apple popularizing wearable’s as a lifestyle trend.

Smart watches have the greatest revenue potential among all wearable’s through 2019, reaching $17.5 billion," said Angela McIntyre, research director at Gartner.

McIntyre added that though the sales of smart watches are the one of the strongest types of wearables, their adoption would remain much below sales of smart phones.

Fitness wearable’s - which include wristbands, smart garments, chest straps, sports watches and other fitness monitors - continue to increase in popularity, driven in some part by US wellness programmes.

"Of all the fitness wearable’s, sports watches will be the one product- category to maintain its average retail price over the next several years," McIntyre said.

"Race runners, cyclists and divers will choose sports watches over smart watches because the user interface, capabilities and durability are tailored to the needs of an athlete in their sport."

The report also said that head-mounted displays (HMDs) are an emerging market with origins as expensive military projects, and in 2016 the HMD market will progress toward mainstream adoption for consumers and enterprise use.

"New virtual reality HMDs for consumers, such as the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, Sony PlayStation VR, and Microsoft HoloLens are expected to be available along with video games and entertainment content as well as business applications critical for their success," said Brian Blau, research director at Gartner.