Apple Gnawing At RIM, While Android Is Ripping Out Chunks — But Guess Whose Handset Share Jumped Highest

It seems it’s all RIM can do these days just to hang on to the, well, rim. A new report by Business Insider reveals the same predictable result in last quarter’s round of the Smartphone Wars: Apple’s subscriber base is growing, with Android also growing, but at twice the speed — and mostly at the expense of Blackberry-maker Research In Motion.

The figures show Apple gained 1.4 percent of the U.S. smart phone market, and now holds 28.7 percent. But Android seems unstoppable on its surge toward the halfway mark, as it grabbed a 3.1 percent share, giving it 46.9 percent.

RIM, which has seen its fair share of troubles these past few months — including a disastrous service outage  — continues its downward spiral, falling 3.1 percent to just 16.6; Microsoft continues to spin its wheels, and fell half a percent to 5.2 percent.

Hardly surprising is Samsung’s continued steady but slow climb up the handset ladder; the company gained 0.3 percent of the handset market, furthering its lead at 25.6 percent as the number one handset maker in the U.S.

But the biggest gains in handset market share went to Apple — also hardly surprising, given that the 4S is the best-selling iPhone ever. Apple’s whopping 1.4 percent gain pushed it up to 11.2 percent, with RIM again falling .6 percent to land at 6.5 percent.

The figures come from comScore’s quarterly report on mobile subscribers, which tallied U.S. smartphone subscribers from August through November.

[Business Insider via AppleInsider]

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