iPhone 5 sales push iOS to top in America

Market research firm Kantar Worldpanel ComTech have said that iOS is now the top selling smartphone operating system in America, pushing Android phones into second place.

Kantar said yesterday that iPhones now hold a 48.1% share of the U.S. smartphone market, compared against 46.7% for Android. The iPhone 4S outsold Android phones for three consecutive quarters according to the research firm. They said that with the iPhone 5 factored into sales that they will beat their current share within the next two quarters.

Kantar claim they pool their information from 1.3 million worldwide consumers and they also use consumer surveys and third part reports to generate their market share results.

Apple smartphone loyalty is very high, a well known fact in the industry. The Kantar say that 62% of U.S. iPhone 5 sales come from existing iPhone owners who are upgrading from a previous version. They also have documented a 13% movement from Android to iPhone, and a 6% movement from Blackberry devices.

Apple claim the iPhone 5 sold 5 million units in the first three days.

Android smartphones are still dominating worldwide sales however. IDC say that Apple shipped 93 million iPhones globally in 2011, compared to 243 million Android smartphones. IDC have predicted 455 million Android smartphones in 2012 compared against 147 million iPhones.

Kitguru says: The fact that Apple can still compete against the combined might of all Google's partners is impressive.

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