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How popular is the iPhone?

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I don’t really have to say much here, Billshrink.com’s infographic tells it all itself. The info is a tad outdated, but interesting nonetheless. I feel obligated to warn you that this is the biggest infographic I have ever seen, but it’s a very interesting read.

For all those curious on worldwide smartphone market share, Gartner’s August 2010 numbers on sales to end users paints a clear picture on which OS is still in the lead:

  • 41.2% – Symbian
  • 18.2% – RIM
  • 17.2% – Android
  • 14.2% – iOS
  • 5.0% – Windows Mobile
  • 2.4% – Linux
  • 1.8% – Other OSes

It’s pretty impressive how Nokia has a 40% worldwide market share and in the US, they have such a small share.

Source: BillShrink

12 Comments

12 Comments

  1. shauns

    10/01/2010 at 6:38 am

    Isn’t that data… old? October-December 2009 sales? Seriously?

    • shauns

      10/01/2010 at 6:49 am

      Ah well you actually said it was old.

      Smartphone market share numbers are changing so rapidly, I don’t think looking at numbers from a year ago makes a lot of sense – other than for the sake of comparing them to the latest numbers.

      FYI Gartner also has 2Q 2010 sales numbers for the US:

      Android 34.1%
      RIM 33.3%
      iOS 22.2%
      Windows Mobile 4.6%
      Symbian 2.9%
      Others 2.9%

  2. Chris Leckness

    10/01/2010 at 6:44 am

    Yes, as stated in the intro…

    The info is a tad outdated, but interesting nonetheless.

    • shauns

      10/01/2010 at 6:51 am

    • shauns

      10/01/2010 at 6:55 am

      I also found July 2010 usage share numbers from ComScore: https://www.comscore.com/Press_Events/Press_Releases/2010/9/comScore_Reports_July_2010_U.S._Mobile_Subscriber_Market_Share

      They’re a bit different from those in the graphic. According to ComScore:

      RIM 39.3%
      Apple 23.8%
      Google 17.0%
      Microsoft 11.8%
      Palm 4.9%

      • Chris Leckness

        10/01/2010 at 7:00 am

        Yeah, many of the services numbers differ depending on how they put the numbers together. The differences make you wonder. My guess is BillShrink used Garter’s numbers in their infographic.

        • shauns

          10/03/2010 at 9:59 am

          The difference is about usage share vs. sales share.

          Gartner’s numbers are about phones sold, Comscore’s numbers are about phones in use.

          While Android is the fastest selling OS, there are still more Blackberries and iPhones in use today.

          BillShrink’s market share numbers are about the phones in use.
          You can compare those numbers to the ComScore numbers I have posted, which are newer and show that Windows Mobile has lost share (from 15% to 11.8%), while Android has gained (from 13% to 17%) and RIM (35% up to 39.3%) and Apple (28% down to 23.8%) remain number one and two, respectively.

          If you are interested in sales numbers instead, then have a look at Gartner’s numbers.

          There, Android and and Blackberry have changed places, whereas Apple’s share of smartphone sales has remained flat.
          (of course, since the whole market is growing, the number of iPhones that are sold has also increased, despite the percentage staying flat)

  3. Frank

    10/01/2010 at 6:49 am

    Thank you for this great post. Many American forget that there are other people, outside the US, too. And that statistics, taken in the US, don’t show worldwide success.
    However, even in the land of Apple (USA), it’s impressive how fast the market-share of Android grows.
    It’s interesting at all, the smartphone market. Especially after Win Mobile 7, WebOS and MeeGo devices get more popular the whole statistics will look totally different at all.

    • JoeC

      10/01/2010 at 8:40 am

      I’m a long time Windows Mobile user that just got an Android phone (Motorola Droid X). I thought about an iPhone but got tired of waiting for Verizon to pick it up. I am really impressed with Android. It’s a shame that Microsoft stumbled again but having a phone with removable memory (up to 32 GB), a plethora of apps, and a Swype keyboard has made me pick up my iPad a lot less.

  4. aftermath

    10/01/2010 at 7:30 am

    This shouldn’t surprise. I think the reason this surprises some people has something to do with the recent report that the “media” is obsessed with covering Apple and Google. You hear about something a lot, and if you have a marketing-weakened mind then you start to believe things that aren’t based in reality.

    The “apps” pictograph is the funny one.

    The presence and popularity of “apps” continues to be the most misleading part of the iOS experience. If it offered a more complete web browsing experience like that even of a anemic netbook, then most “apps” would be irrelevant. This is exactly why Google thinks it can create an ENTIRE OS that’s basically just a web browser. Apple isn’t the first company to hamper a device and then charge you to regain functionality, they’re just the one’s who figured out how to get people to celebrate it like it’s a good thing. Of course, Apple doesn’t have the same kind of power that Google has. Google wants to makes it free and easy for you to get into their services so that they can start harvesting information from you and make money off of it. In contrast, Apple’s only shot at making money is to hinder your access to all of the stuff on the web that Google wants you to get to. Thus, they make their web browsing experience pretty pathetic and coerce people into buying “apps”. Don’t get me wrong. I hate both approaches, and I equally hate the ignorance and indifference with which they’re treated by the consumer.

    • Chris Leckness

      10/01/2010 at 7:36 am

      Very good points. I am one of those that feels like I couldn’t leave certain apps behind when I set the iPhone down.

      My go to iPhone apps are:
      Twitter
      Facebook
      Pandora
      Fandango
      DirecTV
      iMBD

      Of those, several could be eliminated with a better browser as you indicated. The thing is though, Facebook sucks in a regular PC browser in my opinion. I prefer using the iPhone app to sitting down at a PC to check it out. With the “new” Twitter, I could actually see myself using it in a browser, but I still use a standalone app on my PC as well (Tweetdeck).

      The other thing is games and utilities. Many of them couldn’t be done in a browser environment.

      Very good points though.

  5. Christina

    10/03/2010 at 5:24 am

    Besides their high-end offerings, Nokia makes some affordable phones, so in developing countries although many people want an iphone for a balance of quality and price they buy the lower end Nokias. The pie chart that has Nokia out ahead says for “Mobile Phones” not “Smart Phones”. I lived in China for 12 yrs and iPhones got a slow start there. In the major city where I lived I didn’t see many ads for them til late 2009 when they began to partner with China Unicom. When it comes to smart phones I think most of my Chinese friends, if they could afford it, would get an iPhone before a Nokia N97 for instance, however both are still out of the price range of most consumers there.

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