4 ms·

iPhone overtakes Android to claim majority of US smartphone market

19 points by elorant 4y ago

newaccount2021 4y ago
As an Android user...good! The Android space needs a kick in the ass. Google has been phoning it in (nyuk nyuk) with hardly-premium Pixel phones, nothing in tablets, and meh changes to Android. Samsung continues to produce good hardware, but at crazy prices. The market has a weird split...Google controls Android itself, but Samsung basically owns the Android market. If these two can't figure out a way to put their heads together and really blow people away, they'll continue to lose market share.
- aaaaaaaaata 4y ago
  I was very disappointed at my inability to find a modern Google tablet. I hope Graphene are able to get manufacturing going before I die. The Android community deserves a sigh of relief.
klondike_ 4y ago
Despite having a big early mover advantage, Google botched Android multiple times over the years. The biggest sin is its failure to provide a coherent direct messaging product to compete with iMessage. The network effect with iCloud and iMessage is strong. The second big fuck up is the whole OEM licensing scheme. Maybe this made sense at the time given what happened to the PC market, but now we have a ton of Android phones that barely get security updates for 3 years. Now with all the OEMs dropping "niche" features like headphone jacks and physical buttons, you're just buying a shittier iPhone. The only reason I use Android is because it allows me to sideload FOSS apps, but with coming EU legislation this might be a possibility for iPhones too
- type0 4y ago
  Android has become a bloated mess. I was hoping Android Go could streamline the OS for low end devices but that too seems to be dead-born, even worse than KaiOS (Firefox OS ripoff).
quitit 4y ago
For iphone to now surpass the cumulative share of android brands could point to: not a large change in consumer behaviour, but rather a side effect of fewer Android manufacturers dumping* into the market. Comparing iPhone to Android isn't useful from a consumer preference point of view as the Android experience varies across each major brand (instead such a metric is useful for applicable markets for software developers). The useful metrics for identifying consumers preference are smartphone sales on a per-brand basis, and profit share (one could hone this further to per-experience basis since some Android flagships significantly differ from their lower offerings, but this isn't needed as it only further skews the results to iphone). On both of these metrics iphone has always held a leading position, because firstly it indicates the experience provided by the iPhone was chosen above another brand's experience, and that consumers were willing to part with real money to acquire it. * Dumping, such as offering low cost, or loss-leading devices, BOGOF sales, free devices as part of subscriptions, free trojan horse devices intended to sell media subscriptions or devices so inadequate that they can't meaningfully run non-bundled software, i.e. dumb phones that just happen to run Android.

19 points by elorant 4y ago

newaccount2021 4y ago

As an Android user...good! The Android space needs a kick in the ass. Google has been phoning it in (nyuk nyuk) with hardly-premium Pixel phones, nothing in tablets, and meh changes to Android. Samsung continues to produce good hardware, but at crazy prices. The market has a weird split...Google controls Android itself, but Samsung basically owns the Android market. If these two can't figure out a way to put their heads together and really blow people away, they'll continue to lose market share.

aaaaaaaaata 4y ago
I was very disappointed at my inability to find a modern Google tablet. I hope Graphene are able to get manufacturing going before I die. The Android community deserves a sigh of relief.

klondike_ 4y ago

Despite having a big early mover advantage, Google botched Android multiple times over the years. The biggest sin is its failure to provide a coherent direct messaging product to compete with iMessage. The network effect with iCloud and iMessage is strong. The second big fuck up is the whole OEM licensing scheme. Maybe this made sense at the time given what happened to the PC market, but now we have a ton of Android phones that barely get security updates for 3 years. Now with all the OEMs dropping "niche" features like headphone jacks and physical buttons, you're just buying a shittier iPhone. The only reason I use Android is because it allows me to sideload FOSS apps, but with coming EU legislation this might be a possibility for iPhones too

type0 4y ago
Android has become a bloated mess. I was hoping Android Go could streamline the OS for low end devices but that too seems to be dead-born, even worse than KaiOS (Firefox OS ripoff).

quitit 4y ago

For iphone to now surpass the cumulative share of android brands could point to: not a large change in consumer behaviour, but rather a side effect of fewer Android manufacturers dumping* into the market. Comparing iPhone to Android isn't useful from a consumer preference point of view as the Android experience varies across each major brand (instead such a metric is useful for applicable markets for software developers). The useful metrics for identifying consumers preference are smartphone sales on a per-brand basis, and profit share (one could hone this further to per-experience basis since some Android flagships significantly differ from their lower offerings, but this isn't needed as it only further skews the results to iphone). On both of these metrics iphone has always held a leading position, because firstly it indicates the experience provided by the iPhone was chosen above another brand's experience, and that consumers were willing to part with real money to acquire it. * Dumping, such as offering low cost, or loss-leading devices, BOGOF sales, free devices as part of subscriptions, free trojan horse devices intended to sell media subscriptions or devices so inadequate that they can't meaningfully run non-bundled software, i.e. dumb phones that just happen to run Android.