This year was not a good one if sales of tablets are considered. Even the tablets launched this year did not gather much revenue for the technology giants, and this product category did witness another sloppy year as tablet sales continued its slump. The fall of the Tablet category did not spare even the reigning iPad which might exhibit its first-ever yearly decline in sales since the product category was announced. However, there were some sleek and powerful tablets launched this year that did receive special recognition for their upgraded features. Let’s dig in further to find out who actually won the show in the tablet world this year.
iPad Air 2 emerges the winner
When Apple (AAPL, Financial) launched this tablet in October this year, little had analysts thought that it would win the show this year. But fortunately it did, and thus Apple again emerged to be the leader in this technological space.
The iPad Air 2 has been the thinnest, lightest and newest iPad launched by the tech giant and is almost 18% thinner than the original iPad and is just 6.1 mm thin. The major update is the presence of the TouchID fingerprint scanner on the power button, and the facility given to users to unlock their iPads and shop securely using Apple Pay. Apple claims that this device has a 12x CPU performance upgrade and a whopping 180x GPU performance jump from the original iPad. In fact, in terms of performance this device has received several exclusive reviews from analysts since its launch. Due to several upgrades provided over the earlier iPads launched by Apple, customers flocked to buy this tablet from the Apple stores.
Samsung Tab S 8.4 was the runner-up
Samsung (SSNLF, Financial) has always been on its toes to offer competition to its immediate rival in the tech world, Apple. Thus in a bid to compete with the reigning iPad, Samsung also churned out some nifty tablets this year.
It launched the Galaxy Tab S 8.4 and 10.5, pushing all limits with the super-sharp display and ultra-thin body. The chic-looking Tab S 8.4 has a rubber back and a metallic rim, sports a super AMOLED screen, and has optimized the battery’s usage. Having attempted several times earlier to dethrone Apple, it seems that Samsung has been able to shake Apple’s foundation after the launch of this tablet this year.
With the excellent display, powerful processing and great speaker quality, there is little going against the Galaxy Tab S. Thus, Samsung fans were interested to buy this tablet which is offering competition to Apple’s iPad mini-series.
And the final closing words
Truly, Apple has been ruling the tech world with its high end offerings. But Samsung is playing the catch-up game. Also, Google’s (GOOG, Financial) Nexus 9 can become a rival to Apple’s offerings in the long run. Since the launch of Nexus 9 just happened a few days back it was not possible to compare it with Samsung Tab S or the iPad series but it’s obviously the best option in the Android clan as on date running Android 5.0 Lollipop and powered by 64-bit Nvidia Tegra processor. One thing is clear, though tablet sales were not as much as expected by tech experts this year, the flow of good tablets was there in the market and the best tablets did get a lot of appreciation from the consumers. Let’s stay tuned for the coming year, to check out how the sales chart for tablets grows in the near future.
