The launch of the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus were both smashing successes for Apple… but that doesn’t mean it did anything to hurt Android in the United States. Consumer Intelligence Research Partners passes along some new data showing that Android actually grew its share of new device activations to 67% of all mobile phones between the months of July and September this year. In the previous quarter, Android only accounted for 56% of mobile phone activations, CIRP said.
Of course, CIRP’s data ends on September 30th, which was less than two weeks after the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus officially launched. That said, there should be little doubt that even though the iPhone is massively popular, Android is still on top in terms of overall share.
And what of other platforms besides iOS and Android? According to CIRP’s data they barely even exist. BlackBerry once again accounted for 0% of activations in the quarter and Windows Phone accounted for just 2% of activations. To put this in perspective, consider that basic mobile phones are still being activated at a higher rate than Windows Phone and BlackBerry combined.
“With fewer first time smartphone buyers and most former Blackberry owners having abandoned that platform, Apple and Google now need to fight to take customers from each other,” explains Mike Levin, partner and cofounder of CIRP. “This is always a challenging quarter for iOS, since core Apple customers are waiting for the new iPhone models, and we see more buyers switching from iOS to Android than switching from Android to iOS.”
