Per latest StatCounter Global Stats data, Google’s software platform in August 2011 passed iOS worldwide to rank as the world’s #2 mobile operating system. showing no signs of stopping, Android gained ground at the expense of pretty much every other platform, including Research In Motion’s BlackBerry OS, Symbian OS and Apple’s iOS. Of course, stats can be deceiving and phone makers have been boosting Android’s numbers with dirt cheap handsets and BOGO promotions. Let’s not forget that StatCounter base their data on web usage stats obtained from a network of participating sites so the survey does not necessarily paint a representative picture of the whole market.
That being said, Android was trumped only by Symbian OS, which lost 1.46 percent of market share since June 2011. Symbian OS in August grabbed 32.12 percent market share versus 20.6 percent for Android and 19.41 percent for iOS for the month of August. While Apple’s mobile operating system had pretty much held ground during the June-July period, it dropped 0.62 percentage points between July and August.
In the same period of time, BlackBerry OS declined by 0.64 percentage points. Samsung’s own Bada software for feature phones took 6.04 percent market share in August. Interestingly, Microsoft’s Windows Phone doesn’t even blip on the global radar and is probably tucked away under the ‘Unknown’ category which claimed a 5.72 percent share.
I cant believe there are more Android that Apple users on mobiles out there. Accepting this is not scientific on my train ride this morning i saw 6 iphones and 2 Ipads plus some old nokias and one ipod.. I was the only Android user. Maybe Apple users never leave the Apple internet compound to look at non-Apple websites so they have no idea what the real world is like. Or perhaps the lack of flash support means the web counters dont work properly !