Android 4.x increases share to 10.7% of Android devices

Gingerbread has lost ground for the first time ever, while Ice Cream Sandwich is on the rise
Source: Android Developers

Google has published the latest numbers on the share of Android versions in active use on devices. According to the report, Android 4.x ("Ice Cream Sandwich") is now running on 10.7% of devices while usage of Android 2.3.x , code named "Gingerbread", fell for the first time to 64% in total. This means that Android 4.x has grown more than 50% over last month's figures.

The data is based on information collected from Google's Play store over a fourteen day period ending on 2 July. Android 2.2 ("Froyo") is still the third most used version of the OS, registering 17.3% of all the active Play store usage. The numbers seem to indicate that tablets accessing the Play store are still more the exception than the rule, with the tablet-only Android 3.x, code named "Honeycomb", only making up 2.4% of store activity during the period in question. Some tablets can be presumed to run Ice Cream Sandwich and would be added to that number. Google has not released figures for how much of the actual Play store usage can be attributed to tablet devices.

When analysing these numbers, it has to be taken into account that they do not represent the full Android ecosystem, but only the part of it that actively accessed the Play store during the two weeks in which the data was collected. There are many Android devices being sold that do not have access to the store because they were either never submitted to Google's certification or did not pass it, one popular example of such a device being the Amazon Kindle Fire.

See also:

• Android updates: a vendor lottery, a report from The H.
  

(fab)