While it may look like nearly all the people you see are using the iPhone, statistics from the market research firm, Nielsen, show that those purchasing new smart phones are buying Android based handsets more often than the iPhone.
Nielsen reported that during the last six months, 40.0 percent of smart phone buyers in the United States chose Android -based handsets. The report when on to show that 26.9 percent of buyers went with the iPhone and 19.2 percent of the smart phone purchasers got Blackberry phones.
Since June 2010, new smart phone customers have been choosing more Android phones than iPhones, according to Nielsen’s charts. The other two companies have followed about the same levels as well since then. The reason is due to the fact that there is a strong demand for all kinds of smart phones in general. This has lead to the smart phone market expanding during this timeframe.
Both the demand by consumers and this expansion have caused both iOS and Android to benefit from more people desiring to buy smart phones. Nielsen reported that 45 percent of the people who have recently bought a smart phone chose it instead of a feature phone in November. This is a trend they predict will continue all through 2011.
RIM and its Blackberry phones aren’t doing as well with getting a share of all the new smart phone buyers. In June of 2010, RIM was tops with 35 percent of the new phone buyers, but that dropped to only 25 percent in July 2010. In November 2010, it dropped even further to 19.2 percent of new buyers choosing the Blackberry smart phone.
Nielsen’s report looks similar when you look at the overall consumer market share for the three companies. Apple is keeping a small lead over Android with 28.6 percent of the market next to Android’s 25.8 percent. In June, their numbers were 27.9 percent and 15 percent respectively. RIM, however, keeps losing ground in the consumer market share. In June they were at 33.9 percent and have now fallen to 26.1 percent.
Analysts aren’t surprised by these figures as the mobile ad firm AdMob has reported for months that Android based phones are inching towards iPhone models. In August it was reported that Android phones were selling even faster than iPhones.
With the progress that Android is making, Nielsen analysts are predicting that the race between Apple and Android may be much too close to call.
