Fire TV is best-selling media box in the US - report

08 Jun 2015 | Rasmus Larsen |

Roku has been the leader for years and last year Chromecast rose to second. Fortunes have shifted and Fire TV is the new best-selling media streamer in the US, according to a report by Strategy Analytics.

Fire TV took top-spot in Q1 2015

The report offers insight into Q1 2015 sales for the US market. Over those three months a total of 3.5 million media streamer boxes were shipped to consumers. The number does not include game consoles, Blu-ray players or Smart TVs.

Amazon’s Fire TV (including Fire TV Stick) was the best-selling device with 30% share of sales in the US. Roku ranks second and Google takes third place. The aging Apple TV is now ranked fourth. No numbers were released for the other boxes.

However, there are still more Apple TV boxes in use than any other box. A total of 35.7 million streamer boxes are now installed in the US homes. Since launch, Apple has shipped over 15 million units, Roku nearly 13.5 million, and Google has shipped over 8.5 million Chromecast dongles. 4.5 million Fire TVs have been sold. However, not all of the devices are still in use.

Media streamer sales for Q1 2015

Still early days

Roku’s devices have not seen significant updates for some time but the company is trying to establish itself as a platform for TVs, too. Roku will also add 4K support later this year. Google’s Chromecast has not been updated for almost 2 years and there was no news about an update at Google’s annual IO conference. Google has instead launched the full-fledged “Android TV” platform that offers apps, games, and more. The first “Android TV” based devices have just begun rolling out.

Apple was rumored to launch a new Apple TV box with an app store today at the WWDC conference but it now seems unlikely to happen – at least today. Amazon launched Fire TV in spring 2014 and added the Fire TV stick to its portfolio in late 2014.

It is still early days for media streamer boxes and Smart TVs. Most of the devices are only available for sale in very few countries and as more people start streaming TV and movies over the internet demand for streamer boxes is expected to grow dramatically. The battle for the living room is just getting started.