Android Rising for mobile phones-- 26/04/2009

AdMob has released its March 2009 Mobile Metrics Report, which this time around focuses on Google Android smartphones--meaning, essentially, the T-Mobile G1, since new Android handsets are MIA lately. The AdMob report said Android is actually doing pretty well, with two percent of all U.S. requests. That puts it in the fourth spot behind the iPhone, the BlackBerry Curve, and the BlackBerry Pearl.

However, "fourth place" doesn't mean a whole lot here when you compare it to the iPhone. "Both grew more quickly than the market, but iPhone growth was much faster than Android," the report said. "To put some numbers to this, we found that Android traffic in the US grew an average of 47% per month since it launched five months ago while iPhone traffic in the US grew an average of 88% per month in the five months following the launch of their App Store."

Interestingly, Android has now caught Palm OS in overall smartphone OS market share; each company has six percent of the market. The iPhone leads with 50 percent, while RIM plays second fiddle at 22 percent. Meanwhile, Windows Mobile is sitting in third place at 11 percent.