Who’s who in mobile OS market
Here’s the stats of world market share of top mobile OS makers. Symbian sits quite safely in the top of the list with almost 75% share. Linux earns the 2nd place but some flavour of this OS is used in Japan and China only.
Symbian - 72.4%
Linux - 13.3%
Windows Mobile - 6.1%
Blackberry - 5.3%
Palm OS - 1.6%
Apple OS X (iPhone) - 1.3%
Source: Wikipedia
These figures apply quite well to all world regions. Except for the USA.
It appears North American market is far different from the rest of the world. Windows Mobile, Blackberry and Palm are dominating the market with Apple and Symbian sharing around 10%.
So the bottom line is: Symbian rules all over the world but nobody uses it in USA. Linux only exists in China and Japan yet it has strong positions there. Windows Mobile, Blackberry and Palm OS dominate US market and have little presence in the rest of the world. Apple’s iPhone is down the rating but aims at beating Windows Mobile in 2008.
UPDATE:
2005 Stats - similar figures. No iPhone, Blackberry still young.
2006 Stats - Windows Mobile has 14% according to this one.
Interestingly, all the comparison charts are based on the same reports made by www.canalys.com which is presumably the leader in statistics reports in mobile industry. You could buy one of their reports for about $2,000. But I’d better use Wikipedia.
