Between the Lines

Larry Dignan, Andrew Nusca and Rachel King

Android grows in U.S. smartphone market; Samsung holds steady

By | November 4, 2011, 12:56pm PDT

Summary: Samsung stays at the top of the mobile manufacturer list in the U.S., but the iPhone 4S could make a significant dent in the next report.

Despite its continuing rise internationally, Samsung remained stagnant at the top of the mobile OEM market share with 25.3 percent at the end of September 2011 — the exact same figure from June, according to the latest report from comScore.

Better to stay steady rather than take a tumble. However, those numbers could change for Samsung — more than likely for the better — with the recent release of the Samsung Galaxy S 2 smartphone as well as the unveiling of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

But Apple is still coming on strong and was the only mobile OEM in the top five to see a positive point change to take Apple to 10.2 percent. Note that this mobile subscriber market share report only covers the three month period between June and September 2011, which is before the iPhone 4S was announced as well as before the prices for the iPhone 4 and 3GS dropped to $99 and free on-contract.

Thus, those changes in October will definitely play a huge role in shaping when that report is released next month.

On the smartphone platform side of things, it’s no surprise that Android remains in the top slot month after month. The only interesting point in regards to Google’s mobile OS is that Android grew to 44.8 percent of the U.S. smartphone share with a 4.6 percent increase, which is exactly the same point amount by which RIM decreased.

Additionally, Apple was the only OS maker that was able to post positive results with an 0.8 percent increase (which, again, will definitely change next time), while Microsoft and Symbian both dropped slightly by 0.2 percent each.

[Chart via comScore]

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Rachel King is a staff writer for ZDNet based in San Francisco.

Disclosure

Rachel King

Rachel King has no business relationships, affiliations, investments, or other potential conflicts of interest relating to the content posted in this blog.

Biography

Rachel King

Rachel King is a staff writer for CBS Interactive in San Francisco. Before serving as a contributing editor at ZDNet in New York City for two years, she previously worked for The Business Insider, FastCompany.com, CNN's San Francisco bureau and the U.S. Department of State. Rachel has also written for MainStreet.com, Irish America Magazine and the New York Daily News, among others. Rachel has a B.A. in Mass Communications and History from the University of California, Berkeley and a M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University, where she served as art director for the student magazine, Plated.

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RE: Android grows in U.S. smartphone market; Samsung holds steady
Papapau 9th Nov
@wackoae

I think they are now being opened to the right trend.. For them, I assume, why support a dull phone with less and slow future in innovation? Besides why would these kids want all of them to have the same type of phone? duh..

Tegra 3 has been released, transparent phones are now available (non-smartphone..), etc.. Now given some of these concepts, when do we think Apple would possibly implement one of these? They just released 4S.. I believe that if non-Apple hardware manufacturers will each release 10 phones this coming months, some of them will already have this features..

For them, I think, Android is really promising with lots of cool choices.. better get on the boat early on..
Samsung had ignored US market so far. But things are about to change. For once, launch Galaxy s2, Not in Korea, but in US.
My son bought a brand new Samsung Galaxy 550 this week and power charge only lasts 10 hours, very dissapointing.
0 Votes
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The US is less competitive than other mobile markets: only in the US is your choice of phone dictated by your choice of carrier. Elsewhere, switching carriers is as easy as switching a SIM card. So it's no surprise to see innovative new mobile products increasingly being introduced first elsewhere, and only later coming to the US. They have to go where the money is.
@ldo17 Agreed. I look at the reports of new phones here, on ZDNet, and I'll often see the same phone reviewed 3 or 4 times, with a slightly different name, because it is on a different carrier. That is a lot of extra work for the manufacturers.

Here, in Germany, for example, I can walk into an electronics store, pick the phone I want and then see either what my providers offers as a deal on the phone, or which provider offers the best deal.

Some carriewrs do take some of the smartphones and rebrand them with their logo, but they are still the same phone, just with crapware installed.

Buying unbranded also means I get updates quicker.
You think Apple will take 15% more in 3 months? Dream on man.
0 Votes
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similar as the Nielson study
samzbest@... 4th Nov
Neilson also published a similar study that Android appeals more to the youth and Gen Z
and beats Apple for its eco system and range of devices
http://thetechnologycafe.com/android-grows-its-marketshare-amongst-the-youth-beats-apple-neilson-study/
@samzbest@... (claim) that most android users were mostly uneducated high school dropouts?
@wackoae

I think they are now being opened to the right trend.. For them, I assume, why support a dull phone with less and slow future in innovation? Besides why would these kids want all of them to have the same type of phone? duh..

Tegra 3 has been released, transparent phones are now available (non-smartphone..), etc.. Now given some of these concepts, when do we think Apple would possibly implement one of these? They just released 4S.. I believe that if non-Apple hardware manufacturers will each release 10 phones this coming months, some of them will already have this features..

For them, I think, Android is really promising with lots of cool choices.. better get on the boat early on..

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