While we have seen everywhere that Android devices were king in 2012, we never thought it was as dominant as 70.1% of the market. We could have easily guessed that Android was beating out Apple’s iOS by the landslide in share price that Apple has seen this month.
According to the latest research from our Wireless Smartphone Strategies (WSS) service, global smartphone shipments grew 38 percent annually to reach 217 million units in the fourth quarter of 2012. Android and Apple iOS together accounted for a record 92 percent share of all smartphones shipped worldwide.
Among Google’s Android OS’s grip on the market we see around 152 million phones being activated last quarter alone. This makes Android the favored OS by far seeing as Apple held on to only around 22% of total market share. This means that Android is up by almost 42.7% year over year. At this rate Apple had better come up with something or risk their empire collapsing under the pressure or our little green friend.
Just to give you an idea of how well Android is actually doing, 68.4% of all devices last year being used were Android. This equates to around 3 times what Apple did in the same time frame. Google and its Android OS have most assuredly created a global name thats sure to do nothing but grow from here on out.
Source: Strategy Analytics