Josh Ong
The Mac Observer cited a source inside AT&T on Friday as indicating that the company's stores sold 981,000 iPhones between Dec. 1 and Dec. 27. By comparison, 126,000 Android devices were reportedly sold during the same period.
Basic feature phones apparently performed better than Android at the stores, as 128,000 units were sold during December. Research in Motion's BlackBerry devices continued to languish, with just 74,000 sold this month. Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 fared even worse.
According to the report, the numbers only include AT&T's corporate retail stores, not authorized resellers, online sales, telephone sales or other retail outlets.
Of course, the iPhone's performance at AT&T corporate stores doesn't on its own reflect the device's overall market share. Given that AT&T was the original partner for the iPhone, Apple's handset has long been the best-selling phone on the network.
Recent third-quarter figures from comScore reveal that Android has reached a 46.9 percent share of the smartphone market, compared to Apple's 28.7 percent.
Credit: The Mac Observer.
The publication was unable to confirm with Apple's PR department the numbers provided by its source, as the company declined to comment. AT&T did, however, reveal earlier this month that it expected to have its best quarter ever for smartphone sales because of "strong" performance of the iPhone 4S. The wireless operator sold six million smartphones in the first two months of the fourth quarter and is expected to handily beat its previous quarterly sales record of 6.1 million smartphones.
The iPhone accounted for 56 percent of AT&T's smartphone activations in the third quarter of calendar 2011, even as some customers held out for the iPhone 4S.
Apple CEO TIm Cook said last quarter that he is confident the company will "set an all-time record for iPhones" during the December quarter. The iPhone maker has guided for $37 billion in revenue during the period and is expected by some analysts to surpass the $40 billion mark.
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223 Comments
Jesus, that is 4 times the revenue of Google, and slightly more than 1/4 all of Samsung, not just Samsungs mobile division! Or is my math nerfed?
AT&T now have decent Android-based phones so the excuse regarding only crappy Android phones are on AT&T can't be used. And we obviously can't use the mass exodus from AT&T once other US carriers get the iPhone excuse.
So what gives, Android fans? Are you finally willing to admit the iPhone is the most popular phone or are still holding out to find so quasi-statisitic that pegs iPhone iOS against all Android OS activations for a very specific timeframe?
AT&T now have decent Android-based phones so the excuse regarding only crappy Android phones are on AT&T can't be used. And we obviously can't use the mass exodus from AT&T once other US carriers get the iPhone excuse.
So what gives, Android fans? Are you finally willing to admit the iPhone is the most popular phone or are still holding out to find so quasi-statisitic that pegs iPhone iOS against all Android OS activations for a very specific timeframe?
Who has denied that the iPhone was the most popular single phone?
Are you inventing arguments?
Who has denied that the iPhone was the most popular single phone?
Slapppy. He'll say that the numbers in the title are actually reversed. Or, at least, will be shocked if they're not by 2012.
Stunning if true! The other shoe is that Apple's customer satisfaction and retention is far higher than Android's (which therefore must be getting its sales from the non-iOs sector). So, in theory, Android will soon or later be squeezed out at AT&T.