Up to 56% of all US consumers may own a wearable at this point

The Manifest polled a total of 581 people in the US in 2019 for its latest study on the subject of wearables. It reportedly revealed that 56% of these respondents already had at least 1 of these devices, whereas an additional 13% were thinking about buying one next year. This suggests that the market for these products remains strong.

The Apple Watch remains the most successful device in this category. However, The Manifest now believes that Google has a better chance of competing in the future, especially now that it owns Fitbit and its relevant resources. The publication has some advice for the Mountain View giant in toppling the market leader from its place in the sun.

This involves exploiting several aspects of what made Fitbit and its devices so popular while it was an independent company. They include the battery life associated with these wearables. Furthermore, its UX, with its straightforward and accessible style, may be a real asset against the Apple Watch. Then again, existing Fitbit users may be less comfortable with the final recommendation contained in this report: leverage their data.

Apple has a possibly unparalleled panel of user activity and other information (even down to ECGs) garnered from its active Watches. Now, Google may be in a position to gain a similar in-depth return on health-related data now that it may have access to Fitbit's databases of the same.

The company may have already expressed misgivings about its new parent's Ads arm; however, that does not mean that the data it has already collected cannot now be turned to other uses that involve outdoing its main rival in health-tracking terms.