With three out of every four smartphones being shipped worldwide running on Android, Google’s operating system is growing at a fine pace in the third quarter of the year, with Apple’s iOS being the only challenger. Going by the Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker report given by IDC, out of the 181.1 million smartphones, 75 percent of them, that is, approximately 136 million, ran on the Android platform and only 14.9 percent, approximately 26.9 million, ran on iOS.
Analysts agree that Android has come a long way since its launch in the year of 2008, with a growth of 91.5 percent this year, as compared to the 71 million smartphones running on the operating system same time last year. Android is currently giving strong competition to Apple, Microsoft’s Windows Phone and Blackberry, shaping up as a primary growth engine in the market for smartphones, surpassing challengers every year. Even as iPhone 5 was about to be launched, Android was activated on about 500 million devices this September.
Shipments of Android run smartphones are on an increase owing to the collective support of mobile operators, vendors and users. The tactic of competitive pricing has helped Google and carriers make Android devices popular, as opposed to the expensive devices delivered by their rival Apple, explained Android’s Director of Business Development, John Lagerling. Android has been working on a range of functions concerning notifications and widgets, all of which is gradually proving to be effective, with the OS looking more polished with every iteration and making it a widely respected operating system in the market.
The only operating system, apart from Android, to have a double digit market share was iOS. Among other platforms, 7.7 million smartphones ran on RIM’s Blackberry OS, 4.1 million smartphones operated on the Symbian system, 3.6 million smartphones operated on Windows Phone 7 and 2.8 million on Linux, in the third quarter.
Since the demand for smartphones is increasing in the United States, Google’s launch of the Nexus 4 smartphone alongside the Nexus 10 and Nexus 7 tablets is going to give Android an added advantage over its competitors, with the iPhone yet to catch up. Google’s growth in the smartphone market since their start four years back has been commendable, with Android securing its massive market share worldwide.
