Android won sales battle on smartphones in 2012

Android continues to be the top smartphone system in the world. Samsung which reigned as the top phone manufacturer of 2012 was a big part of its success. It’s no surprise that Android has surged so far ahead of iOS phones. There are so many versions of Android-based phones all over the world, like samsung, LG, HTC and the like, while there are only 6 versions of iPhone that have been released.

It is no surprise to many that in the past, Apple have dominated in the smart phone market. From the release of iPhone 1 to the release of iPhone 4s, Apple have dominated the sales in the market. But with the uprising of its counterpart, Android, the sales of Apple phones have decreased. It is now a matter of perspective when it comes to which phone or OS is better. Android is an open source OS while iOS is not.

Apple sold 130 million smartphones last year, according to Gartner. “Even with the Apple Maps debacle, iPhone owners were not deterred from purchasing new iPhones,” said IDC research manager Ramon Llamas in a statement. Apple released its new iOS phone in 2012, the much-anticipated iPhone 5.

However, according to Gartner it was previous iPhone models, which dropped in price enough to make them a more appealing option in emerging markets, that accounted for much of Apple’s smartphone success.

Even though Apple’s sales are growing, IDC points out that its year-over-year growth is slower compared with the rest of the smartphone market. Samsung sold 384.6 million phones in 2012, only 53.5% of which were smartphones, according to Gartner.

Chinese phone maker Huawei was the No. 3 smartphone vendor spot in the final quarter of 2012. Nokia has been struggling in 2012 but 2013 will be a key year for the company. Its fate is largely tied to that of Windows Phone 8, which runs on Nokia’s latest Lumia phones.

BlackBerry and Windows are competing to win over smartphone customers with their new offerings. BlackBerry released its long-awaited new smartphone operating system and two new handsets in January, and Microsoft debuted its Windows Phone 8 update at the end of 2012. Blackberry’s goal is to persuade its existing users to upgrade and win back some large companies, which were previously its biggest customers.

Overall, the number of phone sales in 2012 actually dropped 1.7% from the previous year, the first drop since 2009. Android clearly dominated the smartphone sales in 2012, while iOs is still in the second place.