Android again was the dominant mobile operating system among U.S. mobile subscribers in the third quarter, while Apple was still the largest smartphone maker, Nielsen reported Tuesday.
All told, Android had 42.8 percent of the smartphone market, comprised of three major manufacturers: HTC (15 percent), Samsung (10.1 percent) and Motorola (10.4 percent) with 7.2 percent made by others.
Apple with its iPhone running iOS was well ahead of any single Android maker, with 28.3 percent of the market. Research in Motion, with its BlackBerry OS, has the second largest share at 17.8 percent. Microsoft’s Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7 OSes took 6.1 percent across several device makers. Neilsen based its results on surveys of 22,200 U.S. mobile subscribers.
The combined Android and iPhone users made up 71 percent of the market. Nielsen found that the two groups downloaded 83 percent of all mobile apps downloaded in the prior 30 days.
Forty-four percent of all U.S. mobile phone users now have smartphones, Nielsen said. For the period of roughly the second quarter, Nielsen said 40 percent of mobile users owned smartphones and that 40 percent used Android, about 3 percentage points below the third-quarter result. In that second-quarter period, the iPhone had 28 percent of the market and the BlackBerry had 19 percent.
Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details.