Apple's iOS takes 65% mobile browser share in June, Android at 20%
Apple has continued to take an increasingly larger share of mobile devices tracked by Net Applications, reaching more than 65 percent in the month of June.
The 65.27 percent share of Apple's iOS platform, which is found on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, was up from 62.65 percent in May. Apple's share has steadily risen, growing from a 53 percent position in August of 2011.
Apple's next closest competitor in mobile browsing market is Google's Android platform, which took 19.73 percent in the month of June. Android has also seen its share grow since last August, when it took 15.98 percent of mobile browsers.
The gains for iOS and Android have been losses for Research in Motion's BlackBerry and Nokia's Symbian platforms. BlackBerry has fallen from 3.33 percent in August of 2011 to 1.87 percent in June, while Symbian has dropped from 6.21 percent last August to 1.49 percent in June.
The latest desktop market data from Net Applications also tracks Apple's Mac OS X share at 6.7 percent of computers browsing the Web. Windows has a dominant 92.2 percent of computers tracked online, while Linux accounts for 1.1 percent.
Among specific browser software, Apple's Safari was tracked with 4.7 percent of the market, well behind Google's Chrome (19.1 percent), Mozilla Firefox (20.1 percent), and Microsoft's Internet Explorer (54 percent).
The 65.27 percent share of Apple's iOS platform, which is found on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, was up from 62.65 percent in May. Apple's share has steadily risen, growing from a 53 percent position in August of 2011.
Apple's next closest competitor in mobile browsing market is Google's Android platform, which took 19.73 percent in the month of June. Android has also seen its share grow since last August, when it took 15.98 percent of mobile browsers.
The gains for iOS and Android have been losses for Research in Motion's BlackBerry and Nokia's Symbian platforms. BlackBerry has fallen from 3.33 percent in August of 2011 to 1.87 percent in June, while Symbian has dropped from 6.21 percent last August to 1.49 percent in June.
The latest desktop market data from Net Applications also tracks Apple's Mac OS X share at 6.7 percent of computers browsing the Web. Windows has a dominant 92.2 percent of computers tracked online, while Linux accounts for 1.1 percent.
Among specific browser software, Apple's Safari was tracked with 4.7 percent of the market, well behind Google's Chrome (19.1 percent), Mozilla Firefox (20.1 percent), and Microsoft's Internet Explorer (54 percent).
Comments
As a mobile OS, iOS has majority share to begin with. It's on iPhones, iPods, iPads.
But Android OS is on PMPs, tablets, handsets, PCs, eReaders, smartwatches, cordless phones, handheld game consoles, portable radios, set-top TV boxes, and other odd device categories.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
53% to 65.7% in 6 months? That's a lot of growth and huge percentage for an OS that pro-Android/anti-Apple people think isn't possible when Google posts the latest activation numbers. How much evidence do people need to see that most Android-based devices are not being used as tools for accessing the internet? Android OS is the new feature phone OS, not the new smartphone OS.
These numbers, once again, also cast serious doubt on the "activation numbers" that Google claims (As well as their relevance, as you point out. I did say a couple of years ago that Android was to be the new "feature phone" OS, which seems could be the case.) Essentially, Google has a (yet another) credibility problem, since what should be the corroborating evidence, doesn't corroborate the story they tell about the growth of the platform.
In any case, this is yet another strike against Android for developers considering whether it's worth investing some of their finite resources in the platform.
At 20% of a very large and fast growing combination of market segments it does seem viable, but developers do have to consider the tools for each platform, the number of device types for each platform (vis-à-vis cost and time), and the likelihood of customer's paying for your app (which also includes payouts from ad support). When you factor all that in Android still looks profitable but iOS looks many times more viable than what these simple netstats show.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX
53% to 65.7% in 6 months? That's a lot of growth and huge percentage for an OS that pro-Android/anti-Apple people think isn't possible when Google posts the latest activation numbers. How much evidence do people need to see that most Android-based devices are not being used as tools for accessing the internet? Android OS is the new feature phone OS, not the new smartphone OS.
Depends on how you define 'feature phone OS'. In terms of it being on cheap phones and used by people who don't care about their phone OS, then sure. In terms of its actual features, power, and flexibility, no way. I *would* say that Android has a VERY polarized userbase. My guess is that 60% of users are on cheap or free on contract phones and probably NEVER open the browser- give them the Facebook app and they are set. Another 25% of users are the VERY techy people/power users that utilize every function of their phones and use the browser heavily. The remaining 15% are somewhere in the middle. Contrast this to iOS users- I would guess that very few of them ONLY use the facebook app- Apple makes it so user friendly that it is easy to utilize many/most functions of the phone. I'm not saying the average iOS user is smarter than the average Android user- the AVERAGE user of any platform in dumb as rocks when it comes to their phone OS- I'm saying that when you put both platforms in front of a 'dumb as rocks' user, they will use the browser much more in iOS than Android- same goes for most of their phone functions.
Congratulations, webkit!
Quote:
Originally Posted by sr2012
This makes no sense, to be honest. What the heck are Android users actually doing with their phones? There's lots more of them, as we are led to believe, but they appear to be not browsing as much, and not paying for apps much, nor are there much Android tablet apps. So really, ~what the heck are they doing with their Android devices~? Do they just make calls, text and play the free version of Angry Birds? That's not very "smart"phone of them.
They spend a lot of time rooting them and trying to tweak the OS to maximize battery life. Who has time to go on the web when you could be doing that?
One of the consistent claims I hear from Android fans is that some Android browsers actually have the mobile Safari signature. That it's the default. I've never seen more than anecdotal evidence for this though. Does anyone know of any statistical measurements that support this, and that indicate it is a significant number?
Maybe that's it. There batteries only last 1/3 of the time of an Apple iOS device. ????
so iOS has 65% and Android 20% of 6.37 total mobile share
Real news here is that most people are not dumb enough to use a mickey mouse OS for their main web browsing use. Most use a PC/laptop running a real OS.
1. Validate the data and, if confirmed
2. Provide an explanation for this phenomenon that is backed up by real data.
Developers in particular need this.
Maybe this is a job for Horace Dediu? His article last September doesn't seem to agree with these numbers http://www.asymco.com/2011/09/21/the-perils-of-possession-without-utilization/
Heaven forbid such a thing would actually show up on these forums. Then we would have nothing to do. LOL.
But yeah, it's weird isn't it... What are Android users actually doing if there are so many of them? And are these visits in aggregate, or over a time scale, or what? Weird.
Yeah, and most people are not dumb enough to use a mickey mouse PC/laptop, it has to be a Retina MacBook Pro. That's 88% of users, because if it ain't Retina OS X it ain't real web browsing.
It's like that point in time when I realised I spent more time tweaking and installing drivers on my PC gaming rig than actually playing PC games. The penny dropped. I had that moment with the most recent Jailbreak. After about 30 minutes I just thought, "too old for this".
Quote:
Originally Posted by sr2012
This makes no sense, to be honest. What the heck are Android users actually doing with their phones? There's lots more of them, as we are led to believe, but they appear to be not browsing as much, and not paying for apps much, nor are there much Android tablet apps. So really, ~what the heck are they doing with their Android devices~? Do they just make calls, text and play the free version of Angry Birds? That's not very "smart"phone of them.
First thing you do on Android device (or should do) is set your browser to Desktop mode - it makes the nonsense of mobile browsing a bit more tolerable - those devices will not count.
It's obvious that the numbers have increased 12%+ because Google Chrome just came out for iOS.
Yes, then I can experience "the full web" with Flash as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sr2012
Yeah, and most people are not dumb enough to use a mickey mouse PC/laptop, it has to be a Retina MacBook Pro. That's 88% of users, because if it ain't Retina OS X it ain't real web browsing.
No not really, there is very little 300dpi art on the web - buying a retina screen for web is like buying a sportscar because it can go 200MPH but using it to go to the supermarket where there is a 50MPH speed limit.
Regardless - Retina display is like a Mahogany drawing pencil - nice, but no real point.
LOL yeah I do feel like a sportscar in commute traffic. To justify my RMBP I really gotta work on Logic, iMovie and iBooks Author. We'll see.