“Each and every day, we are humbled by the trajectory of Android and our partners.
With a year-on-year growth rate of more than 250%, 850000 new Android devices are activated each day, jetting the total number of Android devices around the world past 300 million. These numbers are a testament to the break-neck speed of innovation that defines the Android ecosystem.” Andy Rubin clarified the numbers – activations are only counted once per device ID, and devices without Google services, such as the Kindle Fire, are not counted. Of these 300 million devices, 12 million are tablets – in other words, Apple has very little to fear at this point. Then again, Android on smartphones started out that way as well.
I love android but with those numbers why do I still see 98% iPhones everywhere I go… I seem to always been the only with with an Android phone in large groups.
Just an observation…
Edited 2012-02-27 14:51 UTC
Where are you from? Here in the Netherlands I observe the exact opposite.
It’s interesting that stats like web usage, photos posted to flickr, apps bought etc, are all skewed heavily towards iOS compared to Android. One way to read that is that the iOS platform is used more as a platform, that there are more people who buy Android and don’t use it for much beyond phone calls than there are for iOS.
I generally hate anecdotal evidence but with the proviso that this may mean nothing I have to say that my friends and relatives who use Android phones don’t use them for much beyond calling and maybe taking photos (which they seem to leave on their phones rather than export or post anywhere). I was surprised that my rather geeky brother who builds his own PCs doesn’t play music on his Android phone or read his email or even surf the web, though he does play a few games on it.
It’s just the opposite in my office. I work in a small office (only 5 people). Two of us have Android phones, and the other three have iPhones. There are only two people in the office that only use their phones as just normal phones – and those are two of the iPhone users.
The two of us with Android phones use it to surf the web, email, listen to music (using Google music), playing games, watching movies, etc…
My technology retarded mother purchased an iPhone recently because she just “had to have it”. She uses it as a normal phone and that is it. Apple’s “hype machine” has done a wonderful job by roping in the technology retarded individuals much like AOL did with their CD mailing campaign years ago.
How do explain the differences in statistics concerning usage between iOS and Android?
Genuine question.
Not sure I follow ya…….
Web usage, to be more precise.
It looks like Android owners are less inclined to use the web. I know that first hand from my sister’s experience with her phone. Facebook mostly, and really rarely the web.
My personal theory, based on my own feeling, is that people who buy iPhones want an iPhone do to stuff with.
Most people who acquire an Android don’t even know what they have bought. It was cheap and it looks like an iPhone, so it must be okay.
People I know who use iPhone stare at them all the time, people I know with Android phones, less in number, only use them to make calls.
I agree with the above. I’ll also add that I know too many people to count who have company iphones, while I can’t think of a single person with a company Android.
We’re dropping our BlackBerries. Users can select their phones. They can have a free phone up to 350 euro, if they want something more expensive they need to pay extra themselves.
People chose:
iOS
4x iPhone 3GS
1x iPhone 4
4x iPhone 4S
WP7
3x Lumia 800
1x Lumia 710
Android
2x Galaxy S Plus
2x Xperia S
Symbian
2x E7-00
The iPhone 3GS was chosen because, well it’s an iPhone and 349 euro.
I chose the Lumia 800 because I already have an iPhone and it isn’t an Android. Two people also picked it, because it’s on offer.
The Lumia 710 was chosen, because her husband also had one so he could explain her how it works.
The 2 Galaxies were chosen because one person already had a Galaxy and the other person sits next to her and didn’t know what to take.
The Xperias were chosen because his wife has one and the other one because the first one told him his wife was able to use it thus so could he.
The iPhone 4(S) were chosen because I told them it was the best phone when they asked me what to pick.
The Symbians were chosen because they are Nokia’s and both users think that will bring luck when pairing them to their cars.
I guess this shows people don’t give a damn about “open” or “closed”, operating system or (number of) apps. People base their choice on price and what other people recommend. They don’t read reviews or plan to install custom roms/jailbreak their phone.
It’s like what they say – you are the average of 5 of your friends. A friend’s recommendation trumps all.
What if you don’t have so many? Or none at all?
Absolutely right. Most people don’t give a damn, and why should they? If their phone can do what they need it to then whether or not it runs an open or closed OS is completely irrelevant. I never recommend average users over-invest themselves in technicalities that have very little-to-no affect on them.
Thus… you yourself provide counterexamples to what you postulated just an hour earlier, in the post just above:
Maybe you could, I don’t know, try to internalize a bit at least those scarce empirical observations of yours, instead of going first and foremost with premises based on “feeling”? (or is that an Apple thing?)
BTW…
…maybe also look for some new acquaintances.
(plus, that for some reason reminded me of http://plan9.bell-labs.com/wiki/plan9/Mouse_vs._keyboard/index.html and how similar biases of perception, and so on, might be involved; maybe also http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/ )
US stats.
I do wonder if the tablet market could be compensating for the phone statistics. ie x number of android handsets sold, but more tablets (ie devices you’d actually want to use a regular web browser with) are iOS.
Just a thought anyway
I haven’t looked at the statistics in question, but if they just compare iOS to Android you would expect more internet usage from iOS users as Apple, so far, have been much more successful so far in selling tablets than Android companies.
Tablets gives a much better surf experience than a phone, so we can expect that people actually use them for that. Apple iOS devices are also rather costly, so if you buy one, you probably do so because you have need for these features, while peopole who buy a low end inexpensive Android phon do so because it have a nice internet based phonebook and not much else.
According to my own (much too small) observations iOS user indeed tend to use platforms like flickr, twitter, facebook etc. a lot more. I think it is part of the subculture.
Or perhaps it’s just that the segment attracted to social media is the same as the segment attracted to iPhones. Web usage? Hardly: http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_os-ww-monthly-201101-201201
I have a Galaxy Nexus and except for GPS and Navigation, don’t use it for much non-phone stuff. That being said though, the only way you’ll get this phone from me is from my cold, dead hands
EMail? What about that?
Kinda. I’ll check email if I’m out of town or something, but I rarely (if ever) send anything.
Strange as it sounds, I actually have this phone rooted, with a custom rom installed
Also love the Google Voice integration.
it’s much the same for me. I used to use Android for all sorts of weird and wonderful stuff, but these days I just play the odd game of Angry Birds (i know, i know) while waiting for the train, listen to music and text. For me, the novelty of debugging Perl scripts from a 4″ touch screen device and uploading pictures of my cat to G+ has worn off.
But like yourself, I’ve rooted and installed a custom ROM, etc. And like yourself, I wouldn’t trade my phone for the world.
Sometimes it’s just nice knowing you can run SSH tunnels from your phone, stream movies over Netflix or update your Facebook status from a gesture. Sometimes the comfort of knowing it’s possible is more appealing than actually doing it regularly.
It’s still very hard for many die-hard Apple fanatics to understand that not everyone gives two shits about all the things they can do with their phones. None of my friends – iPhone, Android, or otherwise – does any serious amount of emailing or browsing on their phones. It’s all calling, texting, and a few fun games and maybe checking the news.
That’s it.
I’m the only person I know to get more out of my smartphone, but that’s only because my job demands so from me (need to be available at all times). If I gad a different career, I would be just like my friends.
What you’ve described is certainly not exclusive to Apple users — that was just a useless dig on your part. Kids tend to care more about candy than adults. You’re a lot more likely to find a 15 year old that cares if their phone has a Twitter app than a 30 year old.
That’s largely because most 30 years old have more sense than to post their every detail online :p
Wonder if enterprise stats are includes. IPhones are making inroads into corp networks pushed by high level management. Android phones have hard time at this.
And having corp mail and cal available at your hand is blessing at times.
Edited 2012-02-28 21:24 UTC
iPhone in the enterprise is much less of a smartphone than BB, still. Even if more corporates actually buy it, it’s still quite far from making inroads.
I’ll add some more anecdotal evidence. I’m literally back from a concert in Dublin(ended 1h30m ago as of this writing), of a very young oriented band. In the sea of SGS2’s and even some GNex’es, there were a few iPhones.
And since my music interests are skewed towards the same area that the 18 y/o I tend to see iPhone being out-massed by Android devices during such gigs.
However, my gym buddies(in their late twenties) are mostly iPhone owners.
PS: In general I see more iPhone4/s on the streets of Dublin, though.
Edited 2012-02-28 00:28 UTC
Those so called “stats” do not prove anything about the usage of the platform but more so about the type of people using the phones.
For sure you are not living in Europe.
Where I’m from I mostly see BlackBerry’s.
So… has it never occurred to you that your place might be quite atypical, not very representative of the world at large?
Probably has something to do with this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL7yD-0pqZg&feature=related
I seem to see more Androids nowadays…
and how many of these are people replacing a previous android phone?
And how many of all brands are people replacing a previous phone?
Anyway, it doesn’t change anything, phones tend to be handed down within family and such (all types of them, not only Androids; but that’s certainly the case for all known by me Android handsets in my ~surroundings which were “retired”).
Actually, Android mobiles quite possibly have their 2nd (or 3rd…) life more often than, say, iOS ones – just by the virtue of the former seeing relatively more uptake in the “impoverished” (or smth) places, where people tend to be more frugal (quite likely not even on contract – that’s the rule, majority of 5+ billion mobile subscribers uses prepaid)
….Not this nonsense again.
You can add one to that total.
I got rid on my HTC Sensation just before Christmas and have liberated myself by going back to a Nokia 6310( I’ve had this for years)
I really tried to like it but frankly it sucked big time especially compared to the iPhone 4 that my company gave me before that.
In the end, I decided that as I didn’t use all this fancy Social Networking stuff, I really couldn’t justify phone.
I have a netbook with a 3G USB stick for any net access I need while on the move.
Two months on, and I’ve started to enjoy the freedom of not being ‘connected’ to the internet etc 24/7.
It is addictive you know.
There’s plenty of space for both platforms or better all three of them. Just look at the previous quarter for smartphones. If the tablet market evolves in a similar pattern both platform vendors should be content.
Only 12 million tablets goes a long way to showing that the only people who buy tablets are people that think they need an ipad.
the Cult of Pad, now showing in a shiny object store near you.
Just you wait.