Apple Was Caught Off Guard By AirPods Pro 3 Popularity
AirPods Pro 3 popularity caught Apple off guard, triggering supply shortages that impacted quarterly wearable revenue despite record earnings.
Matilda
Apple Was Caught Off Guard By AirPods Pro 3 Popularity
When Apple unveiled the AirPods Pro 3 last September, even company leadership didn't anticipate the frenzy that followed. Demand surged so dramatically that supply constraints temporarily capped growth in Apple's entire Wearables segment—a rare stumble for a product category that typically prints money. CEO Tim Cook later admitted the company was genuinely surprised by consumer enthusiasm, revealing a fascinating gap between Apple's forecasting models and real-world buyer behavior in late 2025. For shoppers wondering why delivery estimates stretched weeks after launch, the answer lies in an unexpectedly perfect storm of upgraded features meeting pent-up market desire. Credit: Google Why AirPods Pro 3 Became an Instant Sellout Apple's supply chain operates with military precision, making genuine shortages uncommon for mature product categories. Yet the AirPods Pro 3 defied expectations almost immediately after pre-orders opened. Unlike incremental updates of previous gener…
