While Apple remains officially silent on the subject, plenty of other companies have opinions about how many Apple Watches it's shipped.

The latest to provide its estimate is market intelligence outfit Canalys.

It says Apple has shipped almost 7 million watches since its 24 April 2015 launch.

In terms of momentum, Canalys analyst Daniel Matte says that Apple has overcome early manufacturing issues and is now "building momentum going into Q4".

Supply and demand

Of course, this is only dealing with the supply part of the equation.

Even if 7 million Apple Watches have been shipped, the issue of how many have been sold is less clear.

Apple's only comment on the matter has been to say Watch sales match the company's internal forecast.

As for other predictions, Tractica's call of 24.4 million smartwatch sold in 2015, including 16.7 million Apple Watches is looking an over exaggeration, especially as Apple has outsold all other smartwatch companies combined by a large factor.

Canalys says Samsung hasn't sold more than 300,000 smartwatches in a quarter, while the new Pebble Time Steel shipped 200,000 in its launch quarter.

[source: Canalys]