In the past six months, the iPhone's share of the smartphone market grew by 7%, going from 43% in April to 50% in October, according to the stats released by AdMob. In the same amount of time, Android went from 3% of the worldwide market to 11%, which means it actually outgrew the iPhone despite the release of the iPhone 3GS.
And in terms of web traffic, the Android is now producing 20% of the U.S. traffic, which is second behind the iPhone's 55%. The interesting statistic here is that the iPhone's share of web traffic actually decreased from 59% to 55% while Android's share almost tripled, going from 7% to 21%.
What does this mean?
It means Android is actually competing with iPhone as the smartphone of choice for those wanting to get on the web. And considering Android's growth, it's easy to say that it will become quite competitive with the iPhone in the next few years.
But will Android overtake the iPhone?
Probably. It might sound like blasphemy now, but Android has one of the same advantages that the IBM-compatible had over Apple in the desktop wars: it is an open platform. While Apple's strict control of the iPhone's hardware, operating system and app store will make it a very stable and easy-to-use environment, Android's open platform will make it much more viral in terms of spreading from smartphone manufacturer to smartphone manufacturer. And with an increased share of the market will come more and more developers, thus mimicking the iPhone's app store.
Of course, this doesn't mean the iPhone is going away. It will no doubt remain the cool smartphone. Just don't expect it to be the market leader forever.
