Android is the most popular mobile OS among US consumers who have bought a smartphone in the past six months, according to data from The Nielsen Company.
Android Doubles Recent Smartphone Marketshare
Between January and August 2010, the percentage of smartphone buyers who purchased a smartphone in the past six months purchasing an Android device sharply jumped from 14% to 32%, a 128% improvement in marketshare.
Meanwhile, RIM Blackberry, which dominated the recently-purchased US smartphone market at the beginning of the year with 34% marketshare, lost 23.5% of that share to end up with 26% of the market in August 2010.
This placed RIM Blackberry in a statistical tie for second place in recently-purchased US smartphone marketshare with Apple iPhone, which dropped from 32% marketshare in January 2010 to 25% marketshare in August 2010, a 22% loss.
Blackberry Retains Overall Smartphone Market Dominance
Among all smartphone owners, Blackberry still holds the dominant share with 31% of the market, though its lead over Apple is declining. Twenty-eight percent of smartphone owners have Apple iPhones, compared to 19% who have Android devices. It is worth noting Android has also more than doubled its total US smartphone market share since January 2010.
comScore: Android Platform Use Grows
Using different metrics, comScore determined US mobile subscribers substantially increased their usage of the Google Android platform in July 2010. comScore MobiLens data indicates 17% of US mobile subscribers used the Google platform (essentially representing the Android mobile OS) in July 2010. While this still places Google well behind number two platform Apple (23.8%) and number one platform RIM (39.3%), it marks impressive 41.7% growth from 12% in April 2010.