Android Took 64% Of All Smartphone Sales Globally In Q1; Windows Phone Continues Modest Gains, Says Kantar
Google's mobile OS Android continues to power ahead as the world's most popular smartphone platform, according to figures out today from Kantar Worldpanel Comtech …
Context & Ripple Effects
The Kantar numbers cap an arc that has been running since at least August 2011, when comScore had Android at 40 percent of US smartphone subscribers and still framing it as the fast-riser chasing Apple. Two years on, Kantar Worldpanel Comtech measures Android at 64% of global smartphone sales in Q1 2013 — no longer the challenger but the default platform most handsets ship with.
The same dataset gives Microsoft its one bright spot: Windows Phone is making modest sales gains, which matters because it is the only remaining candidate for a third ecosystem. Notably, Google itself is hedging the platform war — the company confirmed this week that it brought Google Now to iPhone and iPad via its Search app, continuing its push to put its applications on iOS. The story travelled widely, picked up by BGR, Phone Arena, eWeek, ReadWrite and Yahoo! News among others, making Kantar's quarterly read the benchmark stat for the quarter.
First-order effects
- Android handset makers — Samsung foremost among them — enter Q2 selling against a platform with nearly two-thirds of global sales, while rivals' app and service pitches have to be built for Android first.
- Windows Phone's modest gains give Nokia and HTC a concrete argument in carrier negotiations that a viable third ecosystem exists, even at low single-digit-to-teens volumes.
Second-order effects
- Developers and service companies now face a de facto two-platform build order — Android and iOS — squeezing spend away from BlackBerry and other also-rans, which accelerates their decline.
- Google's decision to ship Google Now on iOS shows the second-order logic of scale: with Android dominant, Google can afford to serve its most valuable services on its rival's platform too, monetizing users wherever they sit.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, the industry settles into an Android-led duopoly where competition shifts from operating system choice to hardware differentiation, services, and price tiers — leaving Windows Phone fighting for survival as the only structural alternative.
- A platform holding roughly two-thirds of global sales accumulates the kind of gatekeeper leverage over apps, search defaults, and distribution that historically draws regulatory scrutiny once the market matures.
The trend: Smartphone platforms are consolidating around an Android-dominated duopoly, with Windows Phone as the last credible bid for a third ecosystem.