This statistic shows the global mobile OS market share, in terms of sales to end users, from 2009 to 2018. In the second quarter of 2018, 88 percent of all smartphones sold to end users were phones with the Android operating system.
Mobile OS - additional information
Smartphone operating systems, often referred to as smartphone OS, are operating systems that operate smartphones, PDAs, tablets and other mobile devices. An operating system allows these devices to run applications and programs, therefore, bringing advanced functions to mobile devices that were previously restricted to desktop computers.
The now-discontinued OS Symbian was the first popular smartphone operating system in the world. With the launch of Ericsson‘s R380 in 2000, Symbian became the first modern mobile OS on a smartphone. By 2009, Symbian accounted for nearly half of the global smartphone operating systems market, while RIM/Blackberry, also a pioneer in this market, held around 20 percent of the share. Despite the early start, both Symbian and RIM have been almost driven out of the market as new operating systems were released. Apple introduced its first iPhone model to the consumer market in 2007, revolutionizing the market. Prior to the launch of Apple’s iPhone in 2007, smartphones were a rather niche product and had not yet attained mass appeal. As of 2016, Apple’s iOS is the second most popular operating system for smartphones. Since 2011, Apple’s iOS market share has varied between 14 and 21 percent.
Introduced by Google in 2007, Android is the most popular smartphone operating system in the world as of 2016. Since its release, sales of smartphones running on the Android have grown strongly over the years. In 2009, 6.8 million Android smartphones were sold. By 2015, this figure had risen to more than 1.16 billion. Android accounted for around 85 percent of all smartphone sales to end users worldwide in the beginning of 2016.
