iPhone and Android Duopoly Nears Peak With Estimated 99.9% Market Share Last Year

[santaliqueur]

Just think what Apple’s market share might be if their phones were $50 to $100 cheaper...

You better write Apple immediately, I bet they never thought of this!

Do people really think they know more than companies worth nearly $1 trillion? Chances are they know what they are doing. Since they have 60% of the profits for the entire industry, they really don't care about market share. At all. It's a number that fanbois love to trash talk over.

The only thing that matters in business is profits, and Apple is wiping the floor with everyone else.

 

[AppleScruff1]

You better write Apple immediately, I bet they never thought of this!

Do people really think they know more than companies worth nearly $1 trillion? Chances are they know what they are doing. Since they have 60% of the profits for the entire industry, they really don't care about market share. At all. It's a number that fanbois love to trash talk over.

The only thing that matters in business is profits, and Apple is wiping the floor with everyone else.

I thought all that mattered was products and people?

 

[Abazigal]

Without a sizable market share developers will suffer and without developers and apps the ecosystem is dead.

To add on to my earlier point, I would argue that it’s also not so much market share which matters, but usage share. iOS has aggregated the best customers, who are more inclined to spend on apps and content.

Compare this to android, which rakes in far less in app revenue despite outnumbering iOS 6:1 in market share. Google reportedly earns more on iOS than from their own platform. There are tons of metrics which show ios users punching above their weight when it comes to engagement and expenditure.

Apple has long surpassed the critical threshold and this tired old market share argument stopped applying to them a long time ago, IMO.

 

[SeminalSage]

I wish Windows phone would have made it instead of Google. For the same reasons I use my iPhone with a Mac, Microsoft users should be able to “take their OS with them” as well.

This is coming. I've nothing to go on but guesswork, but Windows 10 on ARM is up and running (albeit still nerf'd). Microsoft will not reenter the market with a Windows Phone, they will enter the market with a phone that runs Windows.
https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/5/16734402/windows-10-arm-snapdragon-laptop-hp-asus-lenovo-hands-on

 

[cmiller4642]

I’d like to see all of the other handset manufacturers vs Apple and Samsung in the United States. They are the ones with the duopoly.

 

[entropys]

It's going to be almost impossible for anyone to break into this market as Apple/Google will just buy them out as soon as they gain traction. A Linux mobile open source OS is the only hope really, but I'm aware Ubuntu tried this and it didn't get anywhere.

This is the problem with capitalism, as soon as giant companies become so dominant it's almost impossible for real competition to ever get a foothold (not just thinking Apple/Google here, but also Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft etc)

Yes, that is the trouble with capitalism all right. Steve Ballmer totally agrees with you. He told me so on his windows phone.

Here is a big /Sarcasm to make it more obvious for you.
Unless of course you were being ironic, given this thread is about the disappearance of the once market dominant blackberry, Nokia and windows phones.

 

[redneckitengineer]

Where’s my new Nokia 3310 that works in the US? I miss having a dumb phone that would survive a nuclear blast. I love my iPhone X, but sometimes it’s nice to swap the SIM to a dumb phone for a backpacking or kayaking day. I wouldnt cry over a broken $40 phone.

 

[BlargKing]

Where’s my new Nokia 3310 that works in the US? I miss having a dumb phone that would survive a nuclear blast. I love my iPhone X, but sometimes it’s nice to swap the SIM to a dumb phone for a backpacking or kayaking day. I wouldnt cry over a broken $40 phone.

I feel that. I've got an old flip phone tucked away in a drawer for days I want to disconnect.

 

[AgentAnonymous]

And this is why America is #1. Our innovation is unmatched. The rest of the world is free to thank us though for giving them iOS and Android.

 

[Cloudkicker]

Just think what Apple’s market share might be if their phones were $50 to $100 cheaper...

Exactly. Which is why Mac OS is in perpetual single digit penetration after nearly 40 years. The idea of "user experience over profits" rings quite hollow. Apple is an elitist company driven by profits first.

They make damn kickbutt hardware besides software. They really do, as much as I rail on them. I firmly believe they could make solid built mid-market laptops, tablets & phones. Their OSs penetration would spike... but they know most of their potential buyers would flock to that, thus costing them profits from $1000 iPhone X that is more than double the profits vs. cost to make it.

It's like they're dangling a carrot (superior OS) in front of you & saying "you want to eat, you buy the carrot in 24k gold wrapper".

It feeds their pocketbooks & their egos. This is why iPhone has the overall penetration it does.

 

[fairuz]

This is how I like it. Two sides so there's competition, but not 10 different standards competing and making everything incompatible.

 

[Cloudkicker]

It does when borked Android phones are tossed on the trash heap after 18 months, while my iPhone is still in use for 5+ years.

Proof?
[doublepost=1519345345][/doublepost]

You do know that the vast majority of older iPhones suffer from no battery problems at all, right? It was a small, bad batch of batteries that initiated the whole battery throttling issue to begin with.

Same thing with Samsung & exploding batteries. lol

 

[jhwalker]

I'm curious how these break down by country. Yeah it's an 86%/14% worldwide split, but it seems like almost everyone I know has an iPhone (myself included). Granted, I live in the US and it's anecdotal, but still.

Exactly. I know two people (out of a circle of perhaps 100 close acquaintances) who have Android-based phones - literally everyone else 1) has a mobile phone and 2) it's an iPhone. US, relatively affluent phenomenon.

 

[kildraik]

I still adore the design RIM sticks with in the Blackberry. Looks tasty.

 

[cube]

Well, if BlackBerry keeps not releasing another BB10 phone, that's bound to happen.

 

[redneckitengineer]

I feel that. I've got an old flip phone tucked away in a drawer for days I want to disconnect.

Omg, I think Nokia made some for the US. I just happened to Google it. https://www.bestbuy.com//site/nokia-3310-3g-cell-phone-unlocked-azure/6092430.p?skuId=6092430

 

[smoledman]

October 19, 2010

“We’ve now passed RIM. And I don’t see them catching up with us in the foreseeable future. They must move beyond their area of strength and comfort, into the unfamiliar territory of trying to become a software platform company. I think it’s going to be a challenge for them to create a competitive platform and to convince developers to create apps for yet a third software platform after iOS and Android”.

Steve Jobs

Steve Balmer on iPhone:

Case closed.

Is ridiculing Steve Ballmer still a thing on Macrumors? I would have sworn it was 2010. In 2018, Microsoft is doing all kinds of cool things with Hololens, XBox One X, VR/AR, Surface, Windows on ARM, Azure, AI, Cortana, etc... This is not the same company that existed in 2007.

 

[Phil A.]

And this is why America is #1. Our innovation is unmatched. The rest of the world is free to thank us though for giving them iOS and Android.

And all thanks to UK developed technology (the ARM processor)

 

[smoledman]

No, this is why the Anglosphere is unmatched! US & UK dominating the world. King George III and George Washington, His Excellency the President would be very proud of us.

 

[gnasher729]

Congratulations Apple!

#2-6 in Computers
#2 in Phones

Beaten by Microsoft and Google.

But congrats to Tim Cook. How else would we have Animojis?
Winning like Charlie Sheen!

Congratulations Apple!

More than 50% of all profits in computer sales.
90% of all profits in phone sales.

Steve Jobs\ declared goal for the iPhone was to get 1% of the phone market. I think they are doing well. And if you compare with Samsung, Tim Cook has never gone to jail. That's better than Samsung.

 

[Abazigal]

Is ridiculing Steve Ballmer still a thing on Macrumors? I would have sworn it was 2010. In 2018, Microsoft is doing all kinds of cool things with Hololens, XBox One X, VR/AR, Surface, Windows on ARM, Azure, AI, Cortana, etc... This is not the same company that existed in 2007.

You mean the Microsoft who goes around telling everyone about how they are going to release a product as part of a grand, revolutionary vision, then delay and watch as everyone else releases a simpler version of that vision based around their smartphone platform (you know, the one Microsoft gave up on), only to finally release an inferior product and then go back and hope that everyone continues to use Word.

Microsoft hasn’t changed. They are still tripping over their own two feet and being their own worst enemy.

 

[chatin]

Intel made big mistakes trying to kill off the StrongARM chips they owned to hurt the small devices market. Ballmer completely missed mobile which is a very good thing for the two most amazing standards the world has ever seen.

 

[WatchFromAfar]

Doesn't matter at all if Apple's total market share is shrinking... as long as their profitable unit sales number (units, not the percentage) is holding up or increasing. The customers who buy profitable devices also send more revenues to developers, thus create more and better apps, as well as better fund Apple's future R&D and marketing. The previous 90%+ market shares of PalmOS plus PocketPC/WindowsMobile and Brew didn't help at all when app developers started fleeing to the far more profitable iOS App store.

But how long will people buy expensive smartphones? Technology always moves downwards and you said it yourself "Apple's total market share is shrinking"
[doublepost=1519376836][/doublepost]

You mean the Microsoft who goes around telling everyone about how they are going to release a product as part of a grand, revolutionary vision, then delay and watch as everyone else releases a simpler version of that vision based around their smartphone platform (you know, the one Microsoft gave up on), only to finally release an inferior product and then go back and hope that everyone continues to use Word.

Microsoft hasn’t changed. They are still tripping over their own two feet and being their own worst enemy.

You mean the same Microsoft that is releasing two new versions of Windows 10 a year as opposed to Apple who've said don't expect nothing but bug fixes for our next OS?

 

[Bacillus]

No, this is why the Anglosphere is unmatched! US & UK dominating the world. King George III and George Washington, His Excellency the President would be very proud of us.

It brought you D.Trump/Boris Johnson
[doublepost=1519377877][/doublepost]

But how long will people buy expensive smartphones? Technology always moves downwards and you said it yourself "Apple's total market share is shrinking"

The number of kidney's on the globe may be limited
(but still allows them to grow two-fold, as Tim figured)

 

[WatchFromAfar]

[QUOTE="
The number of kidney's on the globe may be limited
(but still allows them to grow two-fold, as Tim figured)

At what point is a shrinking market place acceptable? When Apple has 10% market share, 10%, 1% ?[/QUOTE]