comScore gives Android edge over iPhone in fall

Android managed to push past the iPhone in US smartphone market share in the fall, comScore found on Monday. Google's OS swung from 21.4 percent in September to 28.7 percent in December, moving it just ahead of Apple. The iPhone also gained at the same time, but its 25 percent share wasn't enough to keep Android at bay.

The season gave RIM cause for alarm. BlackBerry share dropped from 37.3 percent at the end of the summer to 31.6 percent at the end of the year. The difference was enough to put Android within striking distance for the top spot.

Windows Phone 7 wasn't sufficient to stop Microsoft's share from dropping one and a half points to 8.4 percent, and a lack of new models in the US kept Palm (HP)'s webOS down to 3.7 percent.

Among all phone types, positions stayed the same but saw all but market leader Samsung dragged down by smartphone rivals. Motorola saw the steepest drop as it still wasn't finished weaning itself away from basic phones and towards its Android-centric smartphone mix.

The results came in the last quarter of AT&T's iPhone exclusivity for the US and have faced an unusual situation in which they couldn't be used to predict the share for the quarter ahead. Verizon said the iPhone had already beaten its first-day sales record just for existing customer pre-orders and is likely to see hundreds of thousands of customers buy iPhones on February 10 and skew market share back towards Apple. Google will have the advantage of new Android phones as well, but phones like the HTC Thunderbolt and Kyocera Echo either won't ship until late into the period or will miss the quarter entirely.

By Electronista Staff

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