Android U.S. Ad Request Market Share Surges Past iPhone, iPhone and iPod Touch Device Mix Detailed

[miketcool]

Oh and you really believe that Admob isn't already preparing for the Google takeover? That they would release numbers that show Google in a less favourable light? Come on. A little bit of common sense please..

Not saying that the stats are wrong or anything. Just saying that you could have a field day with those stats and their interpretation. And the stats NOT shown.

And yes, it's pretty obvious that Android will overtake iPhone OS in US market share for given reasons. Unless, of course, Apple decides to diversify to more carriers and models or sth like that (unlikely in terms of models).

Unfortunately, stating what you believe without basis doesn't make it so. Some of us would think that inflating numbers, before a transaction is complete by a large and powerful company, would be foolish because of the potential fallout once the buying company looks at the books. There is a lot to lose, not everything is a conspiracy. Speculation is speculation.

The bottom line is, that ad requests are outpacing iPhone OS in the U.S. by the Android platform. This is good news for Android developers as continuing results such as this should spur a faster growth in Android app development. More ad requests, mean more revenue. This may also further change the OS game for both mobile and desktop. The iAd deal got all the more interesting.

 

[PeterQVenkman]

Apple's answer to this problem is simple:

RELEASE THE iPHONE ON OTHER NETWORKS!!!

 

[ChazUK]

This is making me LOL.

It is common sense that a company would prefer to publish numbers that make themselves look favourably. Would you deny that? It's like you expect Apple would NOT be talking about how successful the iPhone is at their next product launch.

Expect more AdMob graphs in the future that show how big and successful Android is.

Do you think Google would pull out of the purchase of AdMob otherwise? What would Google gain by doing so?

"YOU MADE ANDROID LOOK BAAD! NO MONIE$ FOR YOU!"

 

[hprata]

And by "Most people" you mean the 20 or so that really care and aren't just regurgitating the whining arguments they see on ZDNet and /.?

If anything, I would say the network is what's really holding the iPhone back. It needs to stop being tied only to AT&T and get on others in the US, at least Verizon. (Though I must say, I'm quite happy with AT&T in my area).

In my area At&t is the best as well. Who the hell want to be bombarded by ads?

 

[anthonyjr]

What do you expect when Android is seen across multiple devices and carriers?

 

[lilo777]

Not me I see twice as many ads on Android platform. Where are you seeing ads on iPhone

This chart means nothing I tend to avoid ad drive sites and apps and must admit am a heavy iPhone user. It is possible that a lot of Apple users are the same and Super google supports don't mind ads as they understand that this is googles bread and butter and are more tolerent Good for Google

While this chart indeed may mean very little to average consumer/phone user, it probably speaks volume to advertisers and app developers. The latter will definitely be inclined to shift their efforts towards Android.

 

[ChazUK]

In my area At&t is the best as well. Who the hell want to be bombarded by ads?

Some companies see a market for ad bombardment.....

 

[miketcool]

While this chart indeed may mean very little to average consumer/phone user, it probably speaks volume to advertisers and app developers. The latter will definitely be inclined to shift their efforts towards Android.

Bingo, or at least increase their efforts.

 

[OrangeSVTguy]

Well this is anything but breaking news. The iPhone is only tied to one wireless carrier, officially. The Android has just about everyone and way too many phones as well with many being way cheaper than an iPhone so it's no wonder what the vast majority of people will be choosing.

It's no different with the desktop OS. How many manufacturers out there ship Windows out their products? It's amazing how Apple only has what 10% of the marketshare and yet they break new record profits it seems like each quarter.

Competition is great and that what brings out better devices and features for the future iPhone platform.

 

[adrianm]

Flash?

So doesn't look like Flash is so important for ad delivery after all, if iPhone is only just behind Android.

 

[bigchief]

Competition is good for the consumer. Bring it on.

 

[QCassidy352]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7E18 Safari/528.16)

It's not like we don't all know that Android as a whole won't soon overtake the iPhone in terms of size.

With so many different models (and different software layouts) the platform as a whole is bound to overtake the '1 kind of iPhone' approach that Apple is pursuing.

I suspect the iPhone will be able to be the most popular model of smartphone as we go forward, but that's not what they're talking about here.

This sounds a bit like rationalizing and/or denial. There are three kinds of iPhone's with a fourth coming soon. Yes, you can only get "one" version at a time (with each rev having multiple versions) but it's not like there are 20 major android phones and one single iPhone. The difference is there are multiple android vendors and one iPhone vendor. I see no reason why this would mean that the defacto result would be more android devices in the wild, especially given Apple's marketing capabilities.

I think Android will probably end up doing better than the iPhone in the long run because of it's "free platform" nature. Most people just don't want to deal with a walled garden really. I mean, in five years do people really think the iPhone will be the market leader in smart phones? I sorta doubt it personally (and I'm an iPhone user for the past 2 years).

I've yet to meet a person outside of MR who actually cares about the "free" or "open" aspect of android, including people who own android phones. That's a buzz word. The question is does the phone do what you want.

 

[dashiel]

the android platform is intrinsically tied to ad impressions, google like microsoft makes the majority of their revenue from a very small part of their product portfolio. unlike microsoft with their three money earners google has a single viable revenue generating product: ad sales. android will always be an ad based platform. it will be implemented by different companies with varying degrees of success, but ultimately android will have more ads than iphone.

i suspect with iads you will see an increase in ad based apps on the iphone platform, but they will never have the same necessity to apple as ads do to google.

as others have said this is neither surprising, nor anything to worry about. android by its very nature will command the largest market share, even microsoft may one day overtake apple if their wps7 phones deliver on their early promise. a more apt comparison is to blackberry & palm who like apple supply both hardware and software in one package.

when the dust settles my guess is we'll see android with a 40% market share and apple, rim, microsoft, nokia controlling the remaining 60%. probably something like apple: 25%; rim: 15%; microsoft: 15%; nokia 5%

key issues will be how does rim adequately address the weakness in their operating system? will microsoft's wps7 phones be too little too late, or will they work as well as the demos? will android phone owners continue to buy less apps than their iphone counterparts keeping developers focused on the iphone/ipad platform? will android's freedom for handset makers lead to a balkanization that effectively makes android itself something akin to linux; genetically similar, but different enough in practical aspects that consumers see them as distinct entities?

 

[palmerc]

Is This News?

Does it matter? Look at the report, it basically shows very large numbers of ads being consumed per OS. Android is higher in ad consumption. So? It doesn't talk about the kinds of ads, formats of the ads (flash?), or anything else that would remotely be considered analysis. I have pet theories on why these numbers look the way they do, but without more data it is impossible to draw any conclusions from a series of line graphs and pie charts.

 

[FWW]

Stands to reason that a platform more widely available on more networks, and more open to development by outside entities will gain a larger market share than one locked to a single, somewhat unreliable carrier and closed to many outside development options. Just a matter of time before Apple is again pushed to the fringe in a market they originally cornered.

While OS4 and iAd will bring additional revenue and temporarily stem the tide of slipping market share , I think the lack of "true multitasking", the closed-to-many-development-options nature of Apple, the force feeding of ads to users in apps and being locked to a single carrier will just see Apple back in this situation once OS4 gets long in the tooth.

I happen to be able to exist nicely within Apple's controlled environment, but a large portion of consumers refuse to embrace the iPhone OS until more user control, without a jailbreak, is an option.

/devil's advocate

 

[PhoneI]

Ad traffic, not web traffic.

 

[ChazUK]

People should note that no Android devices currently have Flash 10.1 so I don't know why people keep on about Flash.

The only handsets I know of with flash are the HTC Hero (and I assume Droid Eris) & Desire and that is Flash Lite. The Motorola Droid does not have flash at all.

 

[Speedy2]

Unfortunately, stating what you believe without basis doesn't make it so. Some of us would think that inflating numbers, before a transaction is complete by a large and powerful company, would be foolish because of the potential fallout once the buying company looks at the books. There is a lot to lose, not everything is a conspiracy. Speculation is speculation.

I didn't say the numbers are wrong, inflated or anything. Im just saying I'd expect them to be selected in a way that makes Google look good. How come so many other indicators see the iPhone OS platform still leading (web use, apps, app use etc)? I am not denying that Android will overtake iPhone OS eventually in market share, I just have serious doubts that it has already happened.

While the deal isn't through yet, who really believes it won't happen? When has the FTC last killed a deal (I seriously can't remember)? AT BEST they will formulate some conditions, but I didn't hear a single substantial source expecting the deal to be called off. Did you? So it is safe to assume that AdMob is already preparing to become a part of Google and adjusting its actions accordingly. I'd call that an educated guess and not simple speculation.

 

[thejadedmonkey]

It is also important to note that this specific metric includes only smart phones, and thus does not include ads served to the iPod touch. When looking at all devices capable of accessing AdMob's ad network, the iPhone and iPod touch together grab 38% of the ad request market, more than double that of the nearest competitor on a manufacturing basis, Motorola.

I wonder why no android headset makers don't make versions without a radio and call it a mini-tablet or iPod Touch.

 

[Zadillo]

Why do they only ever report ad requests? I'd be a lot more curious about clickthrough-rates.

Honestly, I wonder just what the clickthrough rates are on a lot of these ads, especially the little text ads that show up in ad-sponsored apps.

 

[sjo]

I don’t believe “most people” even know what a walled garden is. They’re buying Android devices because they’re available on their carrier of choice at all different price points.

It's beside the point whether people are conscious about wallet garden or not. They feel the consequences. Just like most people don't really care to know how many MHz the processor has or whether the OS supports true multitasking or not. They feel that their phone is sluggish or fast, they realize that they can't do something their friend can do with another phone, they buy the model that is suggested to them at the carrier store, t some point they'll wonder why some application is available for other phones from the site of the developer while they have to go to app store to find it.

 

[mcmlxix]

WM and Palm OS are basically dead.

Be careful there, Ballmer might snap back with: “Google's not a real company. It's a house of cards.” or "There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance." and then throw a chair at you.

 

[Apple 1984]

While this chart indeed may mean very little to average consumer/phone user, it probably speaks volume to advertisers and app developers. The latter will definitely be inclined to shift their efforts towards Android.

That is a really big assumption.

 

[Speedy2]

Do you think Google would pull out of the purchase of AdMob otherwise? What would Google gain by doing so?

"YOU MADE ANDROID LOOK BAAD! NO MONIE$ FOR YOU!"

Have you ever worked in a big company at all??

I would expect the person responsible for putting out unfavourable numbers getting fired very quickly. Probably some upper/middle-level exec. No one in such a position would take that risk as there is no personal gain.

 

[hprata]

Yes thats fine

Some companies see a market for ad bombardment.....

Yes thats fine but when it's to much and interferes with the user experience. the market will suffer. It will be considered spam! I personally feel the irrelevance of the ads are already an annoyance. That's why Apples forthcoming mobile Ad system has the potential to revolutionize ads and be the dominate player in ad delivery. I'm sure Google and the rest are already building carbon copies just like they did to the iPhone. Again sparking better delivery so again this chart means nothing it is vague data and smells like PR. But all companies do it. PS I'm in the Advertising world and most ads are lousy in my opinion.