AdMob: iPhones, Android phones on the rise
Apple's iPhone and Android-based smartphones have both seen solid growth throughout the world this year, says a report released Wednesday by AdMob.
The iPhone's worldwide market share jumped from 33 percent to 40 percent over February to August, according to AdMob's "August Mobile Metrics Report," which tracked smartphone usage for that six-month period. AdMob, which serves ads for mobile Web sites and apps, bases its numbers on data from ad requests, impressions, and clicks.
Phones running Google's Android OS picked up a 7 percent market share by August versus only 2 percent in February, thanks to rapid gains in North America and Western Europe, said AdMob. Since its debut this summer, T-Mobile's Android-powered MyTouch has been a top seller in both of those regions.
(Credit:
AdMob)
With the launch of the Pre, Palm's WebOS has also taken off, grabbing a 4 percent slice of the smartphone market in August.
On the downside, older smartphone systems have witnessed a drop in market share, according to AdMob.
The global share for Nokia's Symbian OS fell from 43 percent in February to 34 percent in August. However, Nokia smartphones remain hot sellers, accounting for 12 of the top 20 smartphones tracked by AdMob. Nokia's N97 and 5800 XpressMusic units were the fourth and fifth most popular smartphones in the U.K. for August.
Research In Motion's slice of the market dropped slightly from 10 percent in February to 8 percent in August. Still, RIM's Blackberry devices accounted for three of the top 20 smartphones around the world. The Palm OS, running on older units such as the Centro, declined in share from 3 percent in February to 1 percent in August.
Finally, Microsoft's Windows Mobile also lost share, falling from 7 percent in February to 4 percent in August, according to the report.
AdMob sells and tracks ads on mobile Web pages and applications to more than 7,000 publishers. The company compiled the data for this report based on its analysis of more than 10 billion monthly ad requests from over 160 different countries.
Lance Whitney wears a few different technology hats--journalist, Web developer, and software trainer. He's a contributing editor for Microsoft TechNet Magazine and writes for other computer publications and Web sites. You can follow Lance on Twitter at @lancewhit. Lance is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and he is not an employee of CNET. 
Symbian will still hang around for awhile and might recover, but Windows Mobile is practically dead meat. They might be able to pull out of it with v7, but I suspect it'll be too little, too late.
Note that these are only online figures, but online is where everyone's going.
But don't forget that most of the users actually don't buy any of these phones. In the "non smart" phones market, the picture is totally different. Nokia is still "the king" in the cellular world market, and it'll probably stay there for a while. There are a lot of other players, such as Samsung, LG, etc. which use Win mobile, Android, and Symbian OSes.
In my view, due to the fact that the iPhone OS and WebOS are exclusives to one brand, Android and Win mobile will surpass them in the smartphone category in the coming years.
The question is what will happen once smartphones will be the standard cell phones.
If MS manages to pull decent hardware and put its Zune-like OS on it, it will see market gains.
But it is a good time for Nokia to fire half of the staff, get some new brains, and sprint into action.
That is exactly what Microsoft is doing. I love technology wars )))
Try the following Acid3 test, on any Microsoft browser (IE, Mobile IE, Xbox, Zune HD):
http://acid3.acidtests.org/
These are the results, for the major desktop browsers:
Chrome 2.0 - 100/100
Safari 4.0 - 100/100
Opera 10 - 100/100
Firefox 3.5.3 - 93/100
IE 8 - 20/100
An even more interesting comparison:
iPhone 3GS - 100/100
Zune HD - 5/100
Google Chrome Frame is the only hope for desktop IE. However, a better solution is to replace IE with a modern browser, like Firefox, Chrome, Safari or Opera.
Mobile IE for WinMo is a lost cause. Fortunately, there are great 3rd-party browsers for WinMo (e.g. Opera Mobile).
Xbox & Zune HD users? Who knows? I suspect they are SOL.
The problem is, most people don't realize that Microsoft's browsers are non-standard. They use them because that's what comes installed with the OS. This creates havoc, in the web development community, since developers have to hack their websites, so MS browser users can access them. They create a COMPLETE mess!
If Microsoft is willing to ship browsers like this to paying customers (especially on the Zune HD...supposedly their latest & greatest device), imagine the quality of the other software they're willing to ship.
They neglect to mention that they are one of the largest distributors of ads on iPhone apps, that would definitely skew the numbers a bit.
I'm using a Winmo smart phone without touch right now. I like it fine, however my next phone will be either a Palm Pre or an Android with both touch and a keyboard.
No wonder AT&T are having such problems with their network if 40% of smart phone net users are on it. Serves them right for agreeing to an exclusive deal. I hope something is done about exclusive deals, since they tend to quash competition.
If you are the AT&T network, you have 3 choices: Apple, RIM or Windows. Even phones on T-Mobile that run Android are forced on the Windows at AT&T. Gee... such a selection... Verison is even worse... It is pretty much just RIM or Windows. Given how bad Windows and how sluggish RIM is, it is forcing a lot of people to consider Sprint or T-Mobile.
My contract with AT&T is almost up so likely they will be losing one more customer.
yea a whole lot of people are considering switching to sprint and t-mobile which is why they are the 3rd and 4th ranked carriers in the u.s. and sprint is losing customers every quarter. t-mobile introduces their tiny 3g network when every one else is working on 4g. so yea, you dont know what you're talking about
So basically, the number of Ads seen by iPhone users has gone up and for RiM and Symbian customers, they have gone down. Seems like a good reason not to get an iPhone to me.
As they say 'Lies, damned lies, and statistics' or 'it is not what you say but how you spin it'. I would have hoped CNET would have at least attempted to straighten this out.
So CNET, exactly what market have RiM lost a small piece of and the share of what has been reduced for Symbian. It is not sales as is implied by both the headline and the article. Is it actually the use of sites where AdMob has adverts? Is this likely to be less visited by Business Smartphone users?
Do these figures mean anything besides another way to advertise AdMob?
And Chrome is blazing fast.
- by pinoytutorial November 9, 2009 7:14 PM PST
- Well, this is pretty cool. I didn't have the slightest idea that the ads I were seeing on my iPhone came from one source. Admob is such a potential advertising firm that's when shaked-lightly could produce an extremely big (ROI) Return of Investment to BIG G
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(19 Comments)Will Admob be The New Adsense for Mobile? http://bit.ly/admob-the-new-adsense-for-mobile
You gotta love the timing of Google - having a recent release of Android powered Phones then buying this mobile-advertising firm.