December tablet sales trounce notebooks' entire Q4 figure

Figures from GfK show UK tablet sales more than tripled in 2012

UK tablet sales in the UK for December outstripped shipments of notebooks for the whole of 2012's fourth quarter, according to new figures from GfK.

In the UK in 2012, tablet sales grew by 267 per cent compared with 2011, a surge the analyst puts down to a 23 per cent drop in prices during the period.

Sales of media tablets will continue to boom this year, said GfK account manager Robyn Tovey.

"It seems likely that media tablet sales will continue to grow in 2013 as the availability of lower-priced devices has made buying a tablet a more viable purchase for many consumers. Likewise, tablet cases could be expected to be the key selling product of the luggage market this year," he added.

GfK's figures showed that sales of tablet cases enjoyed similar success in 2012, with volume sales seeing a 174 per cent spike compared with 2011. Notebook cover sales were also outshone, and experienced a fall in volume sales by 24 per cent annually over the same period.