AdMob, Owned by Google, Shows Android Overtaking iPhone in Web Traffic

Pete Mortensen ()

AdMob, Owned by Google, Shows Android Overtaking iPhone in Web Traffic

The Blagoblogs are a-buzz with a report that shows Android has overtaken the iPhone in mobile web traffic. This would be concerning were it not for two things:

  1. The report only shows Android overtaking iPhone in the U.S. (it’s still dominating globally)
  2. The report is created by AdMod, the mobile advertising company owned by Google, and is based on mobile traffic through its network. In other words, it doesn’t count any traffic directed through areas it doesn’t serve, including any by Apple-owned Quattro and many iPhone apps built on other platforms.

Since AdMob is a key part of Google’s mobile strategy at this point and is a key component to any ad-supported Android applications, this is almost exactly the trend we should expect to see. And this trend will only become more dramatic as Apple rolls out iAds in iPhone OS 4.0, which won’t wipe out third-party ad providers in iPhone apps but will likely come to dominate. Don’t be surprised to see a report six months from now showing Apple’s mobile web traffic dropping by half or more.

All of which suggests that a mobile ad network isn’t the best source for reporting the totality of mobile web traffic. Wouldn’t it be nice if all the mobile carriers got together and shared what they knew?

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9 comments »

About the author

Petemortensen

Pete Mortensen is a design strategist for consulting firm Jump Associates and the co-author of Wired to Care: How Companies Prosper When They Create Widespread Empathy, a book and blog that are significantly more interesting than you might initially think. Pete's particular Apple avocations are both around design--interface and industrial. Follow him on Twitter!

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Posted in Advertising, iPhone, News |

  • Gh

    You also have to consider the fact that *most* iPhone users have no intrest and don’t click on ads. No one should ever tap on an ad on a mobile phone ;)

  • http://mackeeper.zeobit.com MacKeeper

    The term *most* can be misleading. If 100 people see the ad and 10 click on it, it can be consdered successful. Oven though *most* passed it by, enough clicked on it to generate traffic on the website and possibly make a purchase. Now imagine that web ads will usually have a couple of million presentation a day. That creates the needed effect. So majority of people ignoring ads is not the point here.
    What this shows is that at the time, in google monitored webspace Androids starts to dominate, which makes them more attractive to advertisers. But as author says, this can not be taken for granted since it does not account for some web segments out of Googles reach, and with the introduction of iAds advertisers will still most likely select the Apple platform even though the shown here iPhone web traffic share will continue to drop.

  • http://www.ainotenshi.org Julian

    AdMob is not yet owned by Google, it still has to be approved.

    While the iPhone still has the superior user experience you can ignore that Android devices will outsell the iPhone eventually. The iPhone will likely remain the most popular among other smartphone models, but Android runs on a growing number of devices. It WILL outgrow iPhone OS.

    The number of statistics that’ll see Android in front of iPhone OS for all kinds of clicks, impressions, share, web usage and even apps sold will increase eventually. You just can’t ignore them all and call them fake or tampered with.

    This isn’t about which device we like most, which one is the better OS or even better looks. It’s about numbers and sales, that’s it. Closing your eyes won’t make it go away.

  • yet another steve

    Trying to figure out the drop in iphone stats. Wondering if it is because more users are using apps and non-ad supported apps at that. If the superior availability of iphone apps is moving people away from the AdMob universe. There are so many websites that now have native iphone app alternatives.

    Remember RIM sells more phones in the US. And since iphone was first, Android would catch it in unit sales before it would catch it in installed base.

    So the likely phenomenon here is a change in the usage pattern of the iphone installed base.

    I’m not saying Android will never catch the iphone (but neither would I ASSUME that it will… Apple can make A LOT of phones and there’s the CDMA card they can play. People always expected iPod to lose its dominant share.

    But anecdotally, man I see a lot of iphones out there. And Blackberries.

  • nabil2199
  • Space Gorilla

    Android fans don’t seem to understand that Apple isn’t interested in dominating the whole market. Apple goes after the premium consumer segment, and does a good job of dominating that segment. Apple is thriving and will continue to do very, very well with a 15 percent share of the total market (perhaps even less). The point is, it doesn’t matter if Android outgrows the iPhone, that’s not going to hurt Apple one bit. From the way the Droid bots talk you’d think the iPhone had 80 percent market share. Insecure much?

  • Hamranhansenhansen

    > [Android] WILL outgrow iPhone OS.

    Prognostications about Android are as useless as prognostications about FlashPlayer for Mobiles. Android was supposed to outsell iPhone in 2009 because, well, it was on 40 phones! and it was supposed to outsell iPhone in 2010 because, uh, it was on 90 phones! It sure seems like it should be outselling Apple’s 1 phone, right?

    No.

    The number of Android phones is just as important as the number of iPhone cases. Put 90 iPhones in 90 different cases and voilà! 90 different models of iPhone. You say, but they are the same inside! Not after 90 users make 90 trips to App Store. Ironically, as gadgety as Android is, it’s iPhone that is endlessly customizable with 250,000 apps and 50,000 accessories. It’s just that the user does it, not the carrier, because for iPhone, the user is the customer. For Android, the carrier is the customer, and the advertiser is the customer.

    Apple has 3 independent companies that assemble iPhones. They can add more any time. There is no real limit to how many they can make. The more they make, the cheaper the parts get and the easier to acquire. There is only 1 model of Android phone that has sold more than 1 million! Apple sells more than a million iPhones per month just in the US. And twice that number internationally, where Android doesn’t sell at all.

    Every year when Apple releases a new iPhone, sales *double*. Every single year. Every year, the number of powerful 3rd party native C apps (which nobody else has) doubles! Android has baby Java apps, no native apps. Whole categories such as 3D games are missing.

    There is no analog to iPod touch on Android. There is no analog to iPad. iPod touch has sold almost as many as iPhone. iPad looks like it will catch up soon.

    The same OS X core powers them all plus every Mac and some other products. Apple can scale to an iOS TV, car system, whatever, with minimal work. Android is designed for phones and takes much more work to use on tablets and other form factors. iOS scales up easy because it’s Mac OS scaled down.

    And iOS updates centrally through iTunes so the last 3 years of devices are always a common platform. Android phones are updated by each carrier and 75% run v1.6 even though v2.2 is out.

    So in spite of Android’s 90 models, it’s actually Apple that is in a better position for growth. They have built a platform to sell a billion a year.

    So with Android, please: less prognostication, less assumption, more actual facts. If Android ever outsells iPhone, let’s talk about it then. For now, let’s congratulate Verizon on selling their 3 millionth Droid after 7 months during their 2 for 1 sale. By far the most successful Android device ever. And honorable mention for Nexus One: 250,000 sold after 5 months. It took Apple a whole weekend of pre-orders to sell that many iPads.

  • David Lau

    Hamranhansenhansen, very very good comment. I haven’t seen such a good comment for so long. Thank you!

  • drewpeteu

    Listen. I can’t believe this! My site traffic jumped to 9283 visitors per day pure Google traffic since I began implementing this. For anyone interested go to http:// bit.ly/cu8nsu. Take care.