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iPhone drops to 24% smartphone share, Android jumps to 17%

New data shows Apple, RIM, and Microsoft continue to lose ground to Google in the U.S. smartphone market.

Marketing intelligence company comScore published its quarterly Mobile Subscriber Market Share findings, which tracked total smartphone subscribers for the three months ending in July. According to the report, 53.4 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the quarter, up 11 percent from the previous quarter.

Of the top 5 platforms, only Google Android grew in market share, from 12 percent to 17 percent of the U.S. smartphone market. Microsoft, Research in Motion, and Apple all lost share, while Palm hovered at 4.9 percent.

The study also found that two out of three subscribers send text messages and one out of three subscribers use a browser on their mobile devices. 31.4 percent of users download applications for their devices, and 21.8 percent access social networks and blogs.

In June, Android passed iOS to become the third-most-popular mobile phone OS in the world, according to Gartner.

"A non-exclusive strategy that produces products selling across many communication service providers, and the backing of so many device manufacturers, which are bringing more attractive devices to market at several different price points, were among the factors that yielded its growth this quarter," said Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner.

In a September research note, the research firm projected Apple will sell 130 million iOS-based mobile devices per year by 2014. In comparison, Gartner projected Android will sell 259 million devices in 2014.



360 Comments

mgl323 15 Years · 247 comments

Android is rising because Apple is letting Android rise. Those numbers/or percentage will soon change once Apple goes multi-carriers (USA) in the future.

donlphi 19 Years · 214 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by mgl323

Android is rising because Apple is letting Android rise. Those numbers/or percentage will soon change once Apple goes multi-carriers (USA) in the future.

When??? Not really asking you, but I think that is what consumers are wondering. People can't just sit around and wait for Apple to become available. People have a need/desire for a phone similar to iPhone. Every month that ticks by, it's another million people that are buying into the Android Market. A huge chunk of those people will probably not switch unless they are "free app only" kinds of folks.

Really, as an iPhone user, that's my main reason for not trying an Android phone. I've already committed to the App Store. That and... every Android phone I use feels cheap and the UI is terrible. Too many layers.

ozexige 15 Years · 215 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by mgl323

Android is rising because Apple is letting Android rise. Those numbers/or percentage will soon change once Apple goes multi-carriers (USA) in the future.

yeah, I was gonna put a positive spin on it too

techapocalypse 15 Years · 58 comments

with the amount of android devices compared to iphone/iOS devices, Android should be ahead. It's kinda sad that they aren't. Google doesn't even make it's own hardware, it's kinda a lame comparison

titan10 18 Years · 26 comments

It is good to have competitors.

It push forward the efforts toward excellence.

And then if people want to have second quality product, let them have.

There are already too much iPhone owner that cannot use it and cannot take advantage of it.Titan10