Apple still owns tablet market, but Android narrows the gap | Hacker News Reader

Apple still owns tablet market, but Android narrows the gap

engadget.com

13 pointsshawndumas24 comments

" Dozens of Android models distributed across multiple countries by numerous brands such as Amazon, Samsung, Asus and others have been driving volumes."

The Kindle Fire really shouldn't be counted as an Android device. What's next, a press release stating Linux hits an all-time high market share, running on devices such as the Mac, iPhone, all Android phones and the Raspberry Pi?

First of all - the world should acknowledge that Linux, the underdog, does power dozens of millions of Android devices.

Also, customers would probably not hold their Kindle Fires right now if it weren't for Android. Developing an OS is an awful lot of work. And while Amazon's intentions are to fork Android, I'm pretty sure they'll come to their senses and just treat their version as a branch.

They'll still insist on having their own curated app store and their own browser of course, but it will be an Android device nonetheless.

That's true but by the same logic the Mac is a Free BSD device. That's a technically correct description but in terms of understanding the market it's not that useful.

The issue with the Fire is that it's forked, that there may be future compatibility issues, that it will never officially become an ICS device and that those things may hold Android back in may ways (for instance app developers always having to work to a low baseline to access the Fire users as a potential market).

So yes it's an Android tablet but it's one that may be a mixed blessing for Android and deserves some subtlety in the distinction.

It remains to be seen, but I think Amazon will shoot itself in the foot if they won't keep up with the latest versions, simply because some developers will ignore the Kindle Fire because of this (while some will do as you say).

I'm seeing this "fork" more like that of Debian and Ubuntu: different software bundled by default, different repository, different philosophies and policies, different management, overlapping user-base, but for practical purposes, they aren't that different.

One breakdown I saw suggested that of the 39%, 24% was Kindle and Nook (that's an absolute 24%, not 24% of the 39%). That's a massive percentage of the market to ignore as a developer.

That was for tablets, right? I'm not surprised considering how shitty the Android tablets have been.

But developers are targeting the phones first, tablets second, because a phone is always in your pocket, always online and everybody needs a phone. In December Google reported 700,000 activations per day. In 2010 alone there were 67 millions of Android devices sold, with the total number of mobile phones sold being measured in the hundreds of millions.

So Kindle Fire does great as far as tablets go, but it can't compete in numbers with Android phones and Android phones are targeted first, unless you're talking about stuff like interactive eBooks that really need the bigger screen.

I'm also seeing this happening on iPhones and iPads. Unless an app really needs the bigger screen, then the iPad is a second class citizen to the iPhone.

Yep.

That's a good point about phones leading the way. I'm guessing that in large part that's because the number of phones (iPhones and Android) dwarfs the number of tablets. I'm always slightly surprised at the number of apps that don't work well on the iPad but it makes sense that you wouldn't put your energy there, at least not in the first instance.

But for those applications that do want to develop a tablet app, it's still a big call to exclude the single biggest selling Android tablet out there (which is probably the Fire).

The percentage of the market looks quite different if a developer is targeting phones as well as tablets.

While it is possible, given that Google has released ICS, I'd be very surprised if the Kindle Fire didn't get ICS in an update the same way the Nook Color got Froyo and Gingerbread in updates. Why?

1. Amazon and B&N are in a dogfight over eBooks, eReaders and (now) "reading tablets". It would be stupid for either of them to skip all of the new functionality and internal improvements Google has released.

2. Plenty of apps Amazon wants in their Appstore are also going to support (and want to use features from) ICS. While Amazon could make them jump through unnecessary hoops, that just makes their Appstore (and, by extension, the Kindle Fire) weaker.

3. Amazon itself is going to be developing applications that support ICS (e.g. Kindle, Amazon MP3, Amazon Mobile, Price Check, ...) and those apps will, in some cases, need to use ICS-specific features to be competitive. They could fork their own internal applications, I suppose, but why would they? Would they really want to risk a situation where an ICS version of an app is better than the Kindle Fire's version of the same app?

good comment, your east-block insights are fabulous!

Why not? Strip away the minor UI changes Amazon made and it's just a 2.3 tablet.

Neither Google nor Amazon consider the Fire an Android tablet.

That is mainly due to the difference in bundled market.

Apple's supply chain (still thinking about it from NYT article on Sunday) is a big reason that Android's numbers aren't even bigger.

I ordered my ASUS Transformer Prime 3 1/2 weeks ago, and Amazon says I'll still be waiting another 2 weeks at least.

The Prime is the first true example of hardware spec superiority to the iPad in the tablet market - granted it may only keep that position for a few months.

However, a multiplatform operating system breeds hardware competition. Hardware performance attracts the games market, and that is one of the software bellwethers.

I think Android is going to continue to push the power of what we can do with a tablet, and we're going to see a similar environment to what we have in the PC market where Apple's offerings plateau in terms of performance much more quickly than its Android counterparts.

Hardware performance attracts the games market

The benefits of a homogeneous set of hardware far outweigh any performance advantages of the anything goes approach. The iPad is "good enough" and predictable.

Hardware performance attracts the games market

I'm not sure this entirely true, the two most popular consoles based on ~6/7 year old hardware.

If these numbers stack up (see other comments) then any budding entrepreneurs out there could do worse than to get into some Android development. I appreciate the arguments about how iOS users purchase more apps but I think if android user numbers are growing then that balance will change as the demographics change.

Comparing the number of these tablets about with the amount of development work available should give some idea of how many apps are being developed currently. The stats here http://jobstractor.com/monthly-stats (my site) suggest android apps could still be relatively wide open.

Does shipments reflect the number of devices manufactured, or the number of devices purchased by consumers? I can't see how the former matters, given the abysmal retail failure of devices like the Playbook.

I didn't realize Android had 40% marketshare, quite amazing! Anything that creates competition is good for the customer.

Only in the "global market".

I.e they add not only Kindle Fire (a custom version which has little to do with Android), but every kind of junk tablet sold all around the world where people can't afford Apple or Apple doesn't have a presence, Applestores etc.

Can we see the same numbers for the US market?

Does anyone else think there's something strange about these figures?

There's still more iOS tablets being sold than Android, so how did Android manage to gain market share? Surely for that to happen, Android would have to be selling substantially more units?

Would love to be enlightened on this!

They're talking about share of current sales, not share of installed base.

Ah, current sales would make sense. Thanks for pointing it out.

Are these numbers sell through to real buyers?

I remember high Android tablet sales in the news a year ago -- later, it was found out they counted deliveries to shops.

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