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Android is eating everyone’s lunch in the U.S. – except for Apple’s

Updated Dec 19th, 2018 8:41PM EST

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The latest U.S. smartphone market share data from comScore shows an interesting twist compared to global data. Fast growth in emerging markets has sent Apple’s global market share plummeting, but the big-money U.S. smartphone market is still very much driven by high-end handsets. According to comScore’s latest data, Apple’s share of the U.S. smartphone market climbed to 39% in Q1 2013 from 36.3% in the fourth quarter last year. Over the same period of time, Android’s share of the U.S. market slid from 53.4% to 52%. Perhaps even more interesting than the figures themselves, however, is the trend among mobile operating systems in the U.S. — Android is still the nation’s top smartphone platform by a healthy margin, but its remarkable growth stopped the iPhone from enjoying impressive growth as well.

Horace Dediu at Asymco is known for putting together great visualizations that offer new perspectives on industry data, and his latest charts do a great job of illustrating where Android’s growth has come from in the U.S. smartphone market. Android’s dominance in the U.S. might lead some to believe it is growing at the expense of all other smartphone platforms, but Dediu’s recent charts paint a much different picture:

As can be seen quite clearly, as Fortune points out, Apple has continued to show steady smartphone growth in the U.S. market even as Android’s growth rate peaked in 2010. The biggest losers apart from webOS, which basically evaporated in 2011, are Microsoft and BlackBerry, both of which went from being smartphone market leaders in America to also-rans.

BlackBerry 10 and Windows Phone are locked in a heated battle in 2013 as they fight for the No.3 spot. With smartphone penetration nearing the point of saturation, any progress one or both of these platforms make will have to come at the expense of either Android or the iPhone. And make no mistake — both platforms are vulnerable right now. Apple seemingly has no plans to release a new iPhone until this coming fall and as can be seen on the charts above, Android has already taken a few steps back.

Zach Epstein
Zach Epstein Executive Editor

Zach Epstein has been the Executive Editor at BGR for more than 10 years. He manages BGR’s editorial team and ensures that best practices are adhered to. He also oversees the Ecommerce team and directs the daily flow of all content. Zach first joined BGR in 2007 as a Staff Writer covering business, technology, and entertainment.

His work has been quoted by countless top news organizations, and he was recently named one of the world's top 10 “power mobile influencers” by Forbes. Prior to BGR, Zach worked as an executive in marketing and business development with two private telcos.