75% of Early iPad Purchasers Already Own an iPad, Early-Adopter Upgrade Cycle Around 23 Months

iPad AirAccording to a survey by PiperJaffray, 75 percent of U.S. iPad Air purchasers on launch day already owned an iPad, compared to only 58 percent for last year's iPad mini launch.

Gene Munster, a PiperJaffray analyst, believes the U.S. market may be getting slightly more saturated.

Surveying 71 day-one iPad buyers, Munster found that the early-adopter upgrade cycle is around 23 months, significantly shorter than the general public's upgrade cycle of 30 months. Also, the average capacity purchased today was 59.7GB versus 40.5GB for the 3rd-generation iPad launch.

Of the iPad Air buyers who already own an iPad (75%), only 18% expected to keep using the old device and essentially all of those users were owners of an iPad Mini. We noted a similar trend in our iPad Mini survey in that 76% of iPad Mini buyers expected to use the Mini along with their prior full-sized iPad. We believe this makes sense as the majority of consumers that already own an iPad seemed to be replacing it with the Air entirely, but viewed the Mini as a companion device to the larger iPad. In other words, if a consumer owns more than one iPad, it is more likely to be an iPad Air and an iPad Mini than multiple full-sized iPads.

With Apple likely selling millions of iPads this weekend, PiperJaffray's survey of 71 buyers is a small fraction but the broader trends could be consistent with the larger U.S. market. 1 in 5 of today's buyers picked up the 128GB iPad Air, while a 94 percent of buyers said they owned an iPhone.

The iPad Air still remains in stock on the Apple Online Store with nearly all configurations available to ship within 24 hours.

Popular Stories

New Things Your iPhone Can Do in iOS 18

20 New Things Your iPhone Can Do in iOS 18.2

Monday December 16, 2024 8:55 am PST by
Apple released iOS 18.2 in the second week of December, bringing the second round of Apple Intelligence features to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 models. This update brings several major advancements to Apple's AI integration, including completely new image generation tools and a range of Visual Intelligence-based enhancements. Apple has added a handful of new non-AI related feature controls as...
iphone 16 apple intelligence

Apple Drops Plans for iPhone Hardware Subscription Service

Wednesday December 18, 2024 11:39 am PST by
Apple is no longer planning to launch a hardware subscription service that would let customers "subscribe" to get a new iPhone each year, reports Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman first shared rumors about Apple's work on a hardware subscription service back in 2022, and at the time, he said that Apple wanted to develop a simple system that would allow customers to pay a monthly fee to gain...
iPhone 17 Pro Dual Tone Feature 1

iPhone 17 Pro Rumored to Stick With 'Triangular' Camera Design

Wednesday December 18, 2024 2:36 am PST by
Contrary to recent reports, the iPhone 17 Pro will not feature a horizontal camera layout, according to the leaker known as "Instant Digital." In a new post on Weibo, the leaker said that a source has confirmed that while the appearance of the back of the iPhone 17 Pro has indeed changed, the layout of the three cameras is "still triangular," rather than the "horizontal bar spread on the...
elevation lab airtag battery

Your AirTag's Battery Will Last for Up to 10 Years With Elevation Lab's New TimeCapsule Enclosure

Wednesday December 18, 2024 10:05 am PST by
Elevation Lab today announced the launch of TimeCapsule, an innovative and simple solution for increasing the battery life of Apple's AirTag. Priced at $20, TimeCapsule is an AirTag enclosure that houses two AA batteries that offer 14x more battery capacity than the CR2032 battery that the AirTag runs on. It works by attaching the AirTag's upper housing to the built-in custom contact in the...
apple tv 4k yellow bg feature

New Apple TV Rumored to Launch Next Year With These Features

Tuesday December 17, 2024 9:02 am PST by
The current Apple TV 4K was released more than two years ago, so the streaming device is becoming due for a hardware upgrade soon. Fortunately, it was recently rumored that a new Apple TV will launch at some point next year. Below, we recap rumors about the next-generation Apple TV. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman last week reported that Apple has been working on its own combined Wi-Fi and...
blackmagic vision pro

Blackmagic Debuts $30K 3D Camera for Capturing Video for Vision Pro

Monday December 16, 2024 4:17 pm PST by
Blackmagic today announced that its URSA Cine Immersive camera is now available for pre-order, with deliveries set to start late in the first quarter of 2025. Blackmagic says that this is the world's first commercial camera system designed to capture 3D content for the Vision Pro. The URSA Cine Immersive camera was first introduced in June, but it has not been available for purchase until...
mac pro creativity

Apple Launched the Controversial 'Trashcan' Mac Pro 11 Years Ago Today

Thursday December 19, 2024 7:00 pm PST by
Apple launched the controversial "trashcan" Mac Pro eleven years ago today, introducing one of its most criticized designs that persisted through a period of widespread discontentment with the Mac lineup. The redesign took the Mac Pro in an entirely new direction, spearheaded by a polished aluminum cylindrical design that became unofficially dubbed the "trashcan" in the Mac community. All of ...
iPhone 17 Slim Feature

'iPhone 17 Air' With 'Major' Design Changes and 19-Inch MacBook Detailed in New Report

Sunday December 15, 2024 9:47 am PST by
Apple is planning a series of "major design" and "format changes" for iPhones over the next few years, according to The Wall Street Journal's Aaron Tilley and Yang Jie. The paywalled report published today corroborated the widely-rumored "iPhone 17 Air" with an "ultrathin" design that is thinner than current iPhone models. The report did not mention a specific measurement, but previous...

Top Rated Comments

Iconoclysm Avatar
145 months ago
In other words, the very very early adopters are more likely to be fanboys, who buy everything Apple makes and thus already had iPads.

This isn't new, but it's nice to have proof.

At some point, people have confused the word fanboy with satisfied customers.
Score: 22 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Patriot24 Avatar
145 months ago
I love my iPad 2. But none of the iPads after it have been worthy enough for me to upgrade to.

If a retina display isn't enough to make you consider upgrading, you'll likely be rocking that iPad 2 forever. In a device like a tablet where the display is 90% of the experience, I can't imagine what else you would want Apple to focus on.
Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Makosuke Avatar
145 months ago
The very general trend is probably correct, but a sample size of 71 seems awfully small to get an accurate statistical representation of the trends involved here. It's not small enough to be anecdotal, but I'm willing to bet the error bars are pretty big (especially if the distribution wasn't geographically broad).

I'm just disappointed that my statistics class was long enough ago that I don't remember how to calculate this properly from an estimated population of, say, a million or two buyers.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Rogifan Avatar
145 months ago
Played with it at Apple today. Very impressive. I would have brought one home if the Notes app was easier on the eyes. The harsh bright white background of Notes was the dealbreaker.

I'm not a huge iOS 7 fan but I could definitely use it if Notes was the old style. I sent feedback to Apple suggesting it be considered as an accessibility option. Not real hopeful but nothing to lose.

The iPad Air is really something. Check it out.
Apple's notes app was a deal breaker for you? Wow. I think I could deal with that and probably find something better in the App Store.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Teste Avatar
145 months ago
In other words, the very very early adopters are more likely to be fanboys, who buy everything Apple makes and thus already had iPads.

This isn't new, but it's nice to have proof.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Rogifan Avatar
145 months ago
I can't believe people take anything Gene Munster says seriously.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)