IDC data shows that in the first half of 2022, the sales volume of China's smart speakers market will be 14.83 million, a year-on-year decrease of 27.1%, and the sales volume will be 4.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 16.2%. During the same period, the sales volume of smart speakers with screens in the market was 5.89 million, down 24.3% year on year, accounting for nearly 40%. Even for Double 11, the relevant data are not ideal.

After a sluggish year, I'm afraid it's hard to have optimistic expectations for the future.

Toubao Research Institute and Sullivan estimate that the annual sales volume of smart speakers will remain at around 38 million by 2026, hovering between 850 million and 88 million, which is a niche market.

In the mobile, short distance and long distance interaction scenarios built by smart phones, smart computers, tablets and smart speakers, the market performance of smart speakers seems to be premature.

Rapidly fall out of favor

In 2017, Alibaba entered the field of smart speakers with 300 million yuan, and one year later, it dropped 3 billion yuan of "artificial intelligence subsidy" to protect its Tmall Genie and its upstream and downstream expansion; At the same time, Baidu and Xiaomi entered the smart speaker track. The former intended to use All in AI, while the latter wanted to consolidate AIoT.

In 2020, Alibaba put forward the "Double Hundred Plan" around Tmall Genie, that is, it invested 10 billion yuan to launch hundreds of smart explosives, looking for the entrance of AIoT and content ecology. The attribute of smart speakers as an ecological starting point is full of imagination space, and its role is self-evident. Plus smart speakers become the extension direction of their respective strategies.

After the price war, smart speakers from various companies piled up at a hundred yuan level. The game of "half sold and half given" is destined to become a one-man show of the head factory, but surprisingly, this ideal "cream field" has a sense of bone in reality.

According to the research data of the Chinese business industry, the domestic smart speaker shipments have declined in the past six years from 2017 to 2022. The three years from 2019 to 2021 are honeymoon period, with the shipment volume of 36.82 million, 37.7 million and 35.15 million respectively. Except that 2017, the first year, is only 1.76 million, the shipment volume in 2018 and January August 2022 is 16 million+units.

Looking back at the development history of smart speakers, the first stage can be called the Bluetooth era. In short, as an extension of Bluetooth for smart terminals such as mobile phones or laptops, smart speakers have become content carriers and connection hubs.

Just like this, smart speakers carry many important tasks such as voice interaction, content output and the interconnection of everything. The new product form once ignited the market. However, the heat is fading faster than expected. RUNTO data shows that the cumulative sales volume of smart speakers in China in the first three quarters of 2022 is 19.11 million, only 54% of the peak in 2019. Obviously, the highlight performance of smart speakers in the three years is unsustainable.