Wi-Fi is becoming a must-have feature across a range of devices, as network connectivity migrates into the living room, reports In-Stat market tracking firm, which claims that in 2014 over 200 million of Wi-Fi-enabled consumer electronics devices will be shipped.

“Wi-Fi swept through the computing market, driven by the need to access and share broadband connectivity. That same consumer desire is now resulting in Wi-Fi adoption across the entire range of connected consumer electronics, driving significant Wi-Fi volumes. The ubiquitous adoption of Wi-Fi in consumer electronics is Wi-Fi’s manifest destiny,” said Frank Dickson, In-Stat’s vice president of research.

Digital televisions, Blu-ray players, and portable media players (PMPs) are among the leading categories in terms of total volume and growth. Shipments of digital televisions with Wi-Fi will grow more than ten-fold, from under 5 million units in 2009, to more than 60 million units in 2014. Driving this shift is both unit growth of the digital TVs, as well as Wi-Fi attach rates that increase from just 4% in 2009 to 33% in 2014. Across all stationary consumer electronics, which includes set top boxes, game consoles, Blu-ray players, digital picture frames, among other devices, Wi-Fi-enabled devices will exceed 200 million units by 2014.

According to the market tracking firm, mobile handsets will remain the highest volume Wi-Fi-enabled device throughout the forecast period, whereas Internet tablets with Wi-Fi will grow to nearly 50 million unit shipments by 2014.

The Wi-Fi device total available market (TAM) will exceed 3 billion unit shipments by 2013.

Tags: Wi-Fi, HDTV, Blu-ray