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Topic: Tablets

Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

Summary: It's been said before there is no tablet market, just an iPad market. However, 2011 started showing that wasn't true and Android is making gains in the tablet space.

Matthew Miller

By for The Mobile Gadgeteer |

Rachel already posted some of the data from the recent tablet market report from Strategy Analytics, but I wanted to chime in with some thoughts from the Mobile Gadgeteer as well. I love and use my iPad 2 all the time, but after filling a role as the tech editor for an upcoming Galaxy Tab book I have to say that the Samsung Android tablets are quite good and likely going to get even better with Ice Cream Sandwich.

I do own an HTC Flyer and find it to be a valuable tool for note taking and portable media needs. Honeycomb didn't impress me too much though and I still have Gingerbread on my Flyer. According to the Strategy Analytics report, Android garnered 39.1 percent of the global tablet share last quarter. This is great considering they were at 29 percent in 2010. Apple still leads with the iPad at 57.6 percent, but that is down from 68.2 percent in 2010 so Apple can't sit around and not worry about Android.

Customized Android interfaces, such as those found on the Amazon Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet, are popular and these two low cost Android devices likely were significant in improving the sales data for Android tablets. We are starting to see other Android tablets come out with unique forms, the Samsung Galaxy Note, and at more competitive prices so it is likely we will see continued growth in Android tablets like we have seen with their smartphones as well.

We will also see Windows 8 coming later this year and the tablet race is far from over. Do you use an Android tablet and did you buy one in 2011 to help increase the market share?

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Topics: Tablets, Android, Hardware, iPad, Laptops, Mobility

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21 comments
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  • Are you quoting me?

    "It's been said before there is no tablet market, just an iPad market."

    I'm just wondering because whenever I write that, the Apple fanbois descend on me like I just uttered the most evil phrase ever. Yet I'm pretty sure that Apple fanbois like David Morgenstern and John Gruber have said the same. Clearly I was wrong though.

    So Matthew, when you quote me, please give me the credit I deserve. Thank you.
    toddybottom_z
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

      @toddybottom_z

      That line is frequently used by ZDNet blogger James Kendrick, don't be an egotist.
      Doctor Demento
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @Doctor Demento
        "don't be an egotist"
        Clearly that was not my intention:
        "Yet I'm pretty sure that Apple fanbois like David Morgenstern and John Gruber have said the same."

        Many Apple fanbois make this claim, I highlighted 2 of them in my post. Yet when I take that to its logical conclusion that this is a monopoly market that is not good for consumers, those same Apple fanbois suddenly start talking about how great Android is. Odd.
        toddybottom_z
        Reply Vote

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      jywhy888
      Reply Vote

  • I read the original article you are referring too.

    It said shipped not sold.

    Pagan jim
    James Quinn
    Reply Vote

    • SERIOUSLY.. is this news? they "SHIPPED" a lot of tablets..

      @James Quinn - ...that are now sitting on shelves collecting dust.. before they are fire sales, because no one wants to buy them.. this isn't news..
      theFunkDoctorSpoc
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @theFunkDoctorSpoc

        Yup, nobody buys them....that's why Apple is flipping out going apepoopy crazy trying to sue Android tablets into nonexistence, because they pose no threat....yup, yup that makes total sense....Apple always spends its money on wasteful, unnecessary pursuits, that's precisely why they have no cash reserves.....
        Doctor Demento
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @DoctorDemento lol

        The greatest ICS tablet I've used to date is the HP Touchpad. That IS saying something...
        Fat Albert 1
        Reply Vote

    • lets look at how Motorola is doing..

      @James Quinn - seems Moto has already shipped all there dust collectors into the channel and resellers are just not going to accept anymore duds taking up shelf space..<br><br>"Motorola Mobilitys latest earnings report: A loss of $80 million on revenue of $3.4 billion, and mobile device shipments of 10.5 million versus 11.3 million a year ago. Still, few were as grim as these: <b>200,000 tablets shipped in the fourth quarter and just 1 million shipped for all of 2011</b>. In other words, it took MoMo a full year to ship 1/15th the number of iPads Apple sold in its most recent quarter.<br><br>And this is the company that Google has decided to spend $12.5 billion on."

      http://allthingsd.com/20120126/motorola-raises-barely-a-ripple-in-the-tablet-wave/
      theFunkDoctorSpoc
      Reply Vote

  • Android eReaders are doing well when sold at a loss

    "Customized Android interfaces, such as those found on the Amazon Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet, are popular and these two low cost Android devices likely were significant in improving the sales data for Android tablets"<br><br>In other words, the only successful Android "tablets" are those that are sold with every single identifiable Android trait removed, by companies that sell these devices as color eReaders, and are sold at a loss with the hopes of making it up later with content sales.<br><br>"We will also see Windows 8 coming later this year"<br><br>This is the only hope we as consumers have that there will be choice in the tablet market. If Microsoft and their OEMs fail, it's over. Our choices in the tablet market for the next 20 years will be "Do I want to buy the latest generation iPad or save $100 and buy last year's model?"<br><br>It is a sick market. We all lose.
    toddybottom_z
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

      @toddybottom_z you always say "its a sick market. We all lose." but the truth is their are options for people who don't want an iPad. They are not as good as the iPad, they don't offer as much as the iPad (App Store), but the choice does exist. This article points out that their is choice in the market for an android tablet/s, please stop insisting the market is sick. If the only product available was the iPad then yes, the market would be sick and Apple could charge whatever they want, but the truth is Apple simply has manufactured the Gold standard in this category and the vast majority of people want it.
      cwbuechler@...
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @cwbuechler@...
        "They are not as good as the iPad, they don't offer as much as the iPad"

        That isn't real choice then. A healthy competitive market would give me the choice of multiple products that were as good as each other. Instead, I can buy an iPad or I have the artificial choice of buying something that sucks. That isn't real choice. That isn't the output of a healthy competitive market. That is like a tyrant holding elections but anyone who votes for a different party is tortured and killed.

        "If the only product available was the iPad then yes, the market would be sick"

        No, that isn't the gold standard. Windows PCs were never the only personal computers available but when Windows had 95% marketshare, that was a sick market. Sure, consumers had the choice to buy a Mac with its awful MacOS but that wasn't a real choice. It would have been better if consumers could have had the choice of Windows or some other excellent OS that was just as good as Windows. Microsoft simply manufactured the gold standard of OSs and the vast majority of people wanted it. Every single one of them could have purchased a Mac. They didn't because when they looked at Macs, they saw how terrible they were.

        Same thing today.

        It is a sick market. We all lose.
        toddybottom_z
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @toddybottom_z
        You do realize Windows still has greater market share than the iPad so I'm not sure what you meant by "that was a sick market".
        anono
        Reply Vote

      • No

        97% of all tablet internet traffic is from iPads. Internet traffic share is the best way of cutting through this shipping vs sold controversy.

        Unless you want to admit that Windows has 97% marketshare, iPad has a bigger marketshare in the tablet market than Windows does in the desktop market.

        I wish you guys would make up your mind about Apple's success. You are more than happy to gloat about how Apple is crushing everyone else in the market when David Morgenstern and John Gruber write that there is no tablet market, there is only an iPad market. Yet when I say the same thing, you Apple fanbois are "no, iPad isn't doing that well, look at how many Android tablets shipped. Android has 40% marketshare. That's really good. There is a tablet market. A strong tablet market full of really good devices that compete very well with the iPad. I know that when friends ask me which tablet they should buy, I tell them that they have their choice of about 10 really nice tablets and that the decision is not an easy one at all."

        Or not.
        toddybottom_z
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @cwbuechler@... <br><br> [i]"but the truth is their are options for people who don't want an iPad."[/i]<br><br>Very true. Not only there's options, there's 90% more options than what we had in the desktop space with Windows monopoly. A consumer walking into a retail store for a PC only really had a choice of Windows or Macs (no retail shop sold you Linux). A consumer walking into a Best Buy today have a whole list of tablet choices, if they don't want iPad. And at all price-point. There's also eReaders and Kindle Fires which according to Amazon is selling pretty well.
        dave95.
        Reply Vote

      • dave95: read up on the difference

        There is a difference between "real" choice and artificial choice. When no one can recommend any of these other "choices" then they aren't real choices.<br><br>Likewise, no one could recommend Macs back in the day so Macs were not a real choice. Anyone could choose a Mac if they wanted to but they would be foolish to do so. Likewise, unless you, dave95, can recommend that people should be buying these other tablets instead of the iPad, their existence does not signify real choice in the marketplace. Just like the existence of the Mac did not signify real choice in the desktop marketplace.<br><br>And you are wrong about PCs and Macs being the only options. There were NeXT machines, OS2 machines, Linux machines (just because they weren't in Best Buy doesn't mean they didn't exist) and Amiga just to name a few. Consumers had many choices, it just so happened that Windows was the only good one. With iPad having 97% marketshare, this proves that either all the other tablets are terrible or they are really good but Apple is keeping them from being successful.
        toddybottom_z
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

        @NZ

        Who are you or I to tell anyone else what's "real choice" or artificial choice, for them? Choice is choice. I use Windows as my primary OS and have no current Macs in my house (It's complicated. I am looking at the Air as my next Mac purchase). But years ago when I had only Macs, who are you to tell me then that this iMac wasn't a "real choice" for me? Your argument is so flawed, not sure why you keep bringing it up.


        Choice before the iPad:

        [i]A few tablet PCs running Windows and costing close to a grand. [/i]


        Choice after the iPad:

        [i]Acer Iconia Tab A100, Acer Iconia Tab A200, Acer Iconia Tab A500, Acer Iconia Tab A501, Acer Iconia Tab A510, Amazon Kindle Fire, Archos 101, Archos 80 G9, Asus Slider, Asus Transformer, Asus Transformer Prime, Asus Transformer Prime TF700T, Asus Memo 370T, Barnes and Nobles Nook Tablet, Coby Kyros, HTC Evo View 4G, HTC Flyer, Kobo Vox, Leader 7-inch Tablet, Leader 10-inch Tablet, Lenovo IdeaPad A1, Lenovo IdeaPad K1, Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet, Lenovo IdeaTab S2, Motorola Droid Xyboard 8.2, Motorola Droid Xyboard 10.1, Motorola Xoom, Pantech Element, RIM Blackberry Playbook, Samsung Galaxy Tab, Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus, Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7, Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G, Sony S Tablet, Sony P Tablet, T-Mobile G-Slate, T-Mobile SpringBoard Honeycomb Toshiba Excite X10, Toshiba Thrive 7-inch, Toshiba Thrive 10, Velocity Micro Cruz T408, Velocity Micro Cruz T410, Velocity Micro Cruz Tablet, ViewSonic E70, ViewSonic Viewpad 7, ViewSonic ViewPad 10, ViewSonic ViewPad 10e, Viewsonic ViewPad 10pro, Viewsonic ViewPad G Tablet, Vizio Tablet VTAB1008, Vizio Tablet VTAB 3010.[/i] - courtesy CNET.
        dave95.
        Reply Vote

  • Android tablet market share up 10%, iPad down 10% through 2011

    There are two issues for discussion. One is the likelihood that Apple will maintain its dominance in the sector with its product, the iPad. Its competition is not Android, but various manufacturers who will use Android, modify Android (as Amazon did), a variation on Windows, and other operating systems. While one may discuss the sector as contention between three operating system, in fact that competition is between Microsoft and Google, battling over manufacturers. Microsoft gets money when the manufacturer chooses it, and gets money when Android is selected because most manufacturers have, so far, said let's get the checkbook out when Microsoft's attorneys have had their tete a tete with them.<br><br>Google gets money as more information being exchanged between parties leads to better advertising results. In theory. (30 years of solicitation calls wherein they know everything down to the toothpaste I use, and they haven't noticed that I always say no.) Look at that, these days Google even makes money if people buy iPhones.<br><br>Long term prospect: others will make tablets and get adequate and perhaps superior market share.<br><br>Now the other point is whether Apple's iPad2 the best of all possible iPads. The answer is obviously no, and as people figure out what matters about what Apple is doing, they will produce good and arguably better products and then it comes down to inside MBAseball regarding sales channels and platforms and supply chains and pricing. (Dare we say that other than lowering their profits, Microsoft and Google don't have a whole lot of latitude there, nor want to care, because that's the manufacturer's problem and they are in the software licensing and advertising businesses, respectively.) Fellow venerable Apple fans such as I have had to understand why the 1984 Mac didn't mop the floor vis a vis DOS running on AT's. I have empathy for Microsoft fans who are troubled by the Zune's story.<br><br>I'm seeing where Apple just put a big stake in the ground that says they want their iPad to be the educational device. They even provided a sales channel and creation infrastructure. Some of the people I listen to imply that a 16:9 ratio is great for movies but awful for textbooks. If Apple's threat is real, then Microsoft, Google, the manufacturers, and Amazon would all have to coordinate on tools, aspect ratios (do you choose to be this or that, you can't be both), hardware, and channels as well. Amazon will make their own Text Kindle and not touch tools. Microsoft will write up minimum hardware specs, write tools (there might be a market there), and will do nothing about the channel. Google will let the community write the tools, do nothing about the channel, and ask Samsung to make a proof-of-implementation Android Text Tablet. Manufacturers gravitate to where the paying customers are. They may pass on the education market in all but a pro forma manner.<br><br>I could be wrong, but the real point I would like to make is that market share expressed as families of operating systems isn't the picture that matters.
    DannyO_0x98
    Reply Vote

  • So if I understand this...

    There were 26.8 million tablets produced/sold last quarter based off of this report.

    15.4 million were iPads.
    11.4 million were Android.

    Now, we know from web stats, Google Android market stats and other usage data, there are only about 6-9 million Android tablets actually in use. We also know at the end of CYQ311, there were about 4-6 million Android tablets in use. So this means, of the 11.4 million Android tablets shipped to be sold, only 2-3 million were actually sold and put to use.

    Are the other 8.4-9.4 million Android tablets on the island of misfit toys?
    Bruizer
    Reply Vote

    • Exactly, these numbers mean nothing

      @Bruizer
      Don't try telling that to anono and dave95 though.
      toddybottom_z
      Reply Vote
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