[tubemonkey]

Google Home ships more units than Amazon Echo for the first time

...uh oh

Google's smart speaker has finally caught up with the Amazon Echo in the area that matters most -- sales.

The Google Home came out more than two years later than the Echo and significantly trailed in capabilities, customer awareness and sales. But it's gradually caught up in capabilities, to the point that the question of which one is better is the subject of many an office debate. Finally, in the first three months of 2018, things are looking up.

Worldwide shipments of Google's line of smart speakers -- including the Google Home Mini and Google Home Max -- pulled ahead of Amazon's Echo line of smart speakers for the first time. It shipped 3.2 million (compared with Amazon's 2.5 million) units in the first quarter of 2018.

The percentage of sales going to the US dropped to less than half thanks to expansion into other regions and increased uptake of smart speakers in countries such as China and Korea.