Fitbit claimed the top spot on the free apps chart in Apple's App Store on Christmas, jumping up 20 positions from Christmas Eve.
The surge signals just how many people received Fitbit devices as Christmas gifts this year. While the number of downloads does not reflect a clear picture on how many trackers Fitbit sold over the holidays, the figure shows how many new Fitbit owners are setting up their devices.
The lucrative fourth quarter has usually been the one when Fitbit's sales have performed the best. Last year's fourth quarter sales reached 5.28 million units of fitness trackers, which is more compared to the number of units sold over the first three quarters of last year combined. In addition, Fitbit saw a 250 percent increase in revenue for the 2014 holiday season compared to the fourth quarter of 2013.
Fitbit has daily been the most downloaded health and fitness app for the iOS from December through Christmas, as reported by App Annie, a mobile analytics company. However, Christmas was the first time that the app claimed the top spot in the free apps chart of the Apple App Store across all app categories.
The popularity of Fitbit's companion app for its fitness trackers continues the modern trend of the spike of downloads on Christmas, when people receive new devices as gifts and then go online to fill them up with apps. Other apps found in the top of the list for free apps downloaded on the App Store include Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, iTunes U and Facebook, presumably made by new iPhone owners.
One takeaway from the surge to the top of Fitbit's app and the correlated great performance of the company's fitness trackers is that the Apple Watch lost that many customers. It could be assumed that every Fitbit device sold potentially means one Apple Watch not sold. One factor for the move away from the Apple Watch and into Fitbit trackers could be the price, as while the Apple Watch's price tag starts from $350 and goes all the way up to over $10,000, Fitbit's devices have a price range of only $60 to $250.
Last month, Fitbit rolled out new software for the Fitbit Surge and Fitbit Charge HR fitness trackers to make them smarter in the face of competition. A new feature named SmartTrack is capable of automatically tracking the activities of the user while the devices are worn, with the data collected from working out directly uploaded to the Fitbit app. Before, users had to start their workouts manually before the Fitbit devices began tracking the activities. SmartTrack will activate once the user has been active for 15 straight minutes, with the length of time needed for the Fitbit device to start tracking able to be adjusted by users.
In addition, Fitbit added a new feature to its app that allows its users to set goals on a daily and weekly basis, allowing them to choose the number of days per week that they plan to work out and the kinds of activities that they would want to contribute towards the achievement of the goals that they set. Fitbit also released updates to the PurePulse heart rate technology in the Fitbit Charge HR and the multi-sport modes on the Fitbit Surge.
With these updates, Fitbit has positioned itself to do well in the holiday shopping season of the fourth quarter, and it seems that the company was able to do so based on the rise of the Fitbit app to the top of the Apple App Store. The exact sales figures will not be released until next year, but it would seem that Fitbit has done well again in the quarter.
