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Digital News Report – While more users turn to the RIM BlackBerry smartphones to keep in touch, Google Android phones are now being used by more people than the Apple iPhone (see chart below). The number of Android users has been moving higher steadily.
ComScore reports that strong advances were made between August and November of 2010. In August only 19.6% of the users owned Android phones. Compare that to 37.6% for RIM and 24.2%. Only 10.8% the Microsoft OS and 4.6% used the Palm.
All of the mobile operating systems gave ground to Android. Users of the Google OS jumped 6.4 percent. See the chart below for more details.
Samsung made the most phones. Samsung manufactured 24.50% of the handsets in November. The trend is in Samsung’s favor as LG, Motorola, RIM and Nokia all lost share.
While Facebook is popular, more people are texting from phone to phone. In fact, it is the number-one use. Of all users 67.10% used the phone for sending text messages while only 35.30% used the browser. Only 33.40% used downloaded apps.
By Mark Williams
| Top Smartphone Platforms | 10-Aug | 10-Nov | Change |
| RIM | 37.60% | 33.50% | -4.1 |
| 19.60% | 26.00% | 6.4 | |
| Apple | 24.20% | 25.00% | 0.8 |
| Microsoft | 10.80% | 9.00% | -1.8 |
| Palm | 4.60% | 3.90% | -0.7 |
| Usage: | 10-Aug | 10-Nov | Change |
| Sent text message to another phone | 66.60% | 67.10% | 0.5 |
| Used browser | 34.50% | 35.30% | 0.8 |
| Used downloaded apps | 32.30% | 33.40% | 1.1 |
| Accessed social networking site or blog | 22.50% | 23.50% | 1 |
| Played Games | 23.00% | 22.60% | -0.4 |
| Listened to music on mobile phone | 14.70% | 15.00% | 0.3 |
| Total Mobile Subscribers: | 10-Aug | 10-Nov | Change |
| Samsung | 23.60% | 24.50% | 0.9 |
| LG | 21.20% | 20.90% | -0.3 |
| Motorola | 18.80% | 17.00% | -1.8 |
| RIM | 9.00% | 8.80% | -0.2 |
| Nokia | 7.60% | 7.20% | -0.4 |
| Source: ComScore |