Canadian Households Adopting Emerging Technology at an ‘Exponential’ Rate: CTA

While Canadians remain avid consumers of televisions, laptops, and smartphones, emerging technologies such as smart speakers are seeing growth in Canadian ownership.

According to the 3rd Annual Consumer Technology and Ownership Study: Canada survey from the Consumer Technology Association, 93 percent of Canadian households own a television, 86 percent own a smartphone, and 75 percents own a notebook, laptop, or netbook. While these three categories are also the three most-desired tech products Canadians want to purchase in the next year, smart speakers are the fastest-growing tech product in Canada.

Smart speaker ownership has grown 12 percent over the past year, with ownership in 15 percent of all Candian households.

“Canadians love technology in their homes – and they’re very tech-savvy compared to other countries,” says Steve Koenig, CTA’s vice president of market research. “Yes, the three screens are still Canada’s most popular products – we see the same top-level ownership trends in the U.S. But our research shows Canadians also are getting excited about the benefits emerging technologies can deliver, whether that’s 4K UHD TV bringing the movie theatre experience right to your living room or voice-activated digital assistants letting you shop and surf the web with just your voice.”

Other emerging technologies have also seen a recent boost in Canadian ownership, with virtual reality technology sitting at seven percent (up six percent from last year), smart thermostats at 13 percent, smartwatches at 14 percents, and action cameras at 21 percent.

Over one-quarter of Canadian households own a 4K UHD television, up 10 percent from last year. That number is similar to the percent of Canadian households that own a television with a display of 60 inches or larger (23 percent). Almost half of Canadian households (47 percent) own digital media streaming devices, while 15 percent have the intent to purchase such a device in the next year.

“Canadian shoppers are excited to get the technology that’s essential to their everyday lives – ‘hub devices’ from smartphones to computers to smart TVs that serve as anchor points for our connected, digital lives,” said Koenig. “Our purchase intent data shows Canadians very much plan to stay up-to-date on tech and take advantage of the latest innovations available.”

Another interesting data point the report explains is that the location in which a household is located has a strong influence on the type of technology owned. Alberta and Ontario, for example, have the highest percentage of smartphone ownership, while Atlantic Canada and Quebec have the lowest. Here are a number of other regional findings outlined in the report:

• British Columbia has Canada’s highest ownership of notebook, laptop and netbook computers.
• Alberta has the highest ownership of smartphones, video game technology, fitness trackers and drones.
• Manitoba/Saskatchewan have the highest ownership of digital cameras and DVD/Blu-ray players, but the lowest ownership of tablets or Bluetooth-handsfree calling devices.
• Ontario has the country’s highest ownership of smart apparel technology.
• Quebec has the lowest ownership of digital media streaming devices, digital cameras and DVD/Blu-ray players, and the second-lowest ownership of fitness trackers.
• Atlantic Canada has the nation’s lowest ownership of smartphones, home videogame consoles and activity fitness trackers.

CTA used a random online sample of 1,000 Canadians in August 2018 to find the data presented here.