According to Web analytics firm StatCounter, the BlackBerry mobile operating system overtook Apple’s iOS (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch) for the first time in November. In the U.S., Apple iOS devices accounted for 33% of Web traffic while Blackberry reached 34.3%.
What’s going on here? Are BlackBerry users really doing more Web surfing?
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The data being reported comes from over 15 billion page views on StatCounter’s network of 3 million+ websites, so we’re not dealing with an inconsequential sampling here.
In addition to BlackBerry’s climb, Android, too, is surging up the charts, says StatCounter. In November 2009, the Android mobile OS was at only 82% market share. By this year, that stat has nearly tripled to 23.8%. In turn, iOS has fallen from 51.9% to 33% over the same time period.
StatCounter CEO Aodhan Cullen notes, “these figures suggest that developers should not be developing solely for the iPhone to the exclusion of BlackBerry and Android.” Frankly, that’s something developers shouldn’t have to be told, we would hope. But in case you thought otherwise – please heed the advice.
We have to emphasize, in case you missed it, that BlackBerry’s lead over iOS is a U.S.-only trend. Worldwide, Symbian leads (31.9%) followed by iOS (21.9%), BlackBerry (19.3%) and Android (11.6%).
Why?
However, what we really wanted to know is why? Why is there more Web surfing on BlackBerry than iPhone these days (here in the U.S.)?
Well, for one thing, BlackBerry’s improved mobile operating system (BlackBerry OS 6) delivered a greatly improved mobile browser experience, which the company said “will be used more frequently than any previous BlackBerry Browser” thanks to its new WebKit rendering engine, tabbed browsing features, RSS support, better user interface, smoother panning and zoom and much more.
Although not conclusive at this point, we’re also tempted to believe that this trend may have something to do with yesterday’s report regarding the rise of app usage.
According to market and research firm Parks Associates, consumers under 35 are ditching the browser for native applications. And who has the most apps? Why, Apple of course. It has over 300,000 apps as of early November. Meanwhile, according to a recent tweet from RIM itself, BlackBerry’s App Word has 15,000.
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