Android, iOS devices sprint ahead in market share

The competing Android and iOS operating systems accounted for 85 percent of all smartphones shipped in the second quarter of 2012, according to analyst firm IDC.

Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker service indicated that while the market share for iOS devices declined from 18.8 percent in the second quarter of last year to 16.9 percent this year, Apple saw a 27.7 percent rise in the number of units shipped — an increase from 20.4 million to 26.4 million across the quarter.

Android devices continue to dominate the smartphone market, according to IDC. The number of shipped devices more than doubled from 50.8 million to 104.8 million year-on-year, giving the Google-developed operating system a 68.1 percent market share.

Devices running Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 and Windows Mobile operating systems also shipped in increasing numbers, with 5.4 million moved this year as opposed to 2.5 million for the same time last year.

However, the market share for Windows Phone 7 only rose from 2.3 per cent to 3.5 per cent.

The losers in the smartphone market were Nokia's Symbian, which dropped 62.9 per cent, and RIM's Blackberry OS, which fell 40.9 percent over the last year in shipped units.

IDC's senior research analyst Kevin Resto called the mobile OS market a "two-horse race" between Android and iOS. While there was still room for some competitors to gain share, he said it would become increasingly difficult to do as smartphone penetration rises.