Apple is a tease – and that’s a good thing, according to new research figures. The late announcement of an iPhone 4S created such pent-up demand among consumers that the Cupertino, Calif. tech giant came within a breath of Android’s U.S. smartphone lead. A wave of sales during the third quarter of 2011 pushed Apple’s share of the U.S. smartphone market to 43 percent, just shy of Android’s 47 percent share.
A survey by consumer research firm NPD Group found during October and November, Apple surged from 26 percent of the domestic smartphone market while Google’s mobile operating system fell off a cliff — dropping from an earlier 60 percent. NPD had earlier proclaimed iOS and Android combined held an 82 percent lock of U.S. smartphone sales.
If the U.S. smartphone market is essentially a question of either iOS or Android, who makes up the single-digit also-rans? BlackBerry maker Research in Motion posted 6 percent of American smartphone sales, down from 8 percent. Windows Phone 7 U.S. smartphone sales were essentially flat-lined, according to NPD.
The survey also found smartphones continue to become increasingly common in the United States. Smartphones in the U.S. comprised 67 percent of all handsets sold during October and November, dominating 15 percent for basic phones.
Apple owns the top three best-selling U.S. smartphones. The iPhone 4S is in most demand, followed by the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 3GS. Despite being older, the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 3GS have sold well. When Apple announced the 4S, it also cut the price of the iPhone 4 to $99 and the iPhone 3GS virtually became free with a two-year AT&T contract.
As for other handsets, Samsung’s Galaxy S 4G was the fourth-most popular smartphone in the U.S., followed by the Samsung Galaxy S II. LG’s Revere took the last spot in the top 10 list – RIM did not even appear.
The NPD numbers are a bit deceptive because they do not include the all-important Christmas period. Google’s Andy Rubin claims 3.7 million Android devices were activated on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Fortune reported a minimum of 4.2 million iOS devices were activated on Dec. 25, potentially overtaking Android sales. The problem is both camps include smartphones and tablets in their activation figures.
However, another clue to the iPhone’s growing strength is a recent report showing 54 percent of people considering buying a smartphone expect to pick and iPhone in 2012. Those numbers surprised ChangeWave Research, which said the iPhone dominated smartphone — even two months after the iPhone 4S was unveiled.
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
8 responses to “Apple iPhone 4S Helps Threaten Android’s U.S. Smartphone Lead [Report]”
Only reason Andriod became as big as it did was because the iPhone was only available on AT&T. Now that it’s on the big three it nearly caught back up to Andriod in one quarter.
if that were true then why did Android continue to grow in 2011 well after the iPhone 4 was on Verizon? I agree with you that it started substantial growth for Android while iPhone was only available on AT&T but Android is on so many devices it’s hard to beat it in market share.
I thought market share wasn’t important to the Apple crowd? What changed??
Because everyone knew a new iPhone was on the horizon. You would’ve been stupid to buy an iPhone 4 halfway through the product’s cycle.
I agree with Tim. People has always realised iPhone is quality and Android phone is iPhone’s alternative. Not the other way round.
This is market share in sales though, not overall market share.
Can anyone remember the day when Apple wasn’t the top dog but we didn’t care because we simply loved Apple? When I got my first mac I didn’t give a damn that OS9/X wasn’t market leader, I just felt good that I had bought such an amazing piece of machinery. Why do we get so wrapped up in market share? Does it mean anything at all to us??
Given that there are currently 3 iPhones competing against literally hundreds of Android-based smart phones, I’d say Apple’s market share is very impressive indeed. Plus Apple beats them all by a very hugh margin profit wise.
Meanwhile, except as an Apple share holder, I don’t really care who has the biggest market share. I care about who has the best. Look at the small auto-market share of BMW …. and the micro-share of Rolls-Royce.
I will say that I own and have used both iPhones and a variety of Android devices. I recently acquired an HTC Titan with WP7. Being and Apple guy, I went in with biased against the WP7 OS but after using it for a week I find it to be brilliant and even further taints my feelings about Android. I have tried the most recent offerings from the Bionic the Nexus and the Galaxy II and frankly, they feel even more like pure junk after comparing to iOS and WP7. It’s true that MS doesn’t have any real marketshare right now but I think once people try out WP7 they will see it as the only real competition of the iPhone. That is, those who care more about the fluid, secure, and user friendly aspects of a smartphone and not those wanna be uber geeks that enjoy rooting run a different bootleg build of Android every other day, or obsessed with silly icons.