As much as Apple has been taking it on the chin from Wall Street, the iPhone maker still takes the top OEM spot in U.S. smartphone market share for the three-month period ending in January, according to the latest numbers from ComScore.
Apple grabbed 37.8 percent of U.S. smartphone subscribers, up 3.5 percentage points from October. That increase outdid even rallying Samsung, which ranked second with 21.4 percent market share, up 1.9 percentage points over the previous quarter. HTC took third with 9.7 percent share, followed by Motorola with 8.6 percent and LG with 7 percent.
On the platform side, Android continued its dominance of the U.S. market. Google’s mobile platform ranked as the top smartphone platform with 52.3 percent market share, while Apple’s share increased 3.5 percentage points to 37.8 percent. BlackBerry ranked third with 5.9 percent share, followed by Microsoft (3.1 percent) and Symbian (0.5 percent).
In is 2013 forecast, ComScore is notes that the U.S. smartphone market has finally surpassed 50 percent market penetration and now enters the “late majority” stage of the technology adoption curve. The number of smartphone subscribers has increased 29 percent from a year ago and 99 percent from two years ago.
While Apple and Android dominate the U.S. market, ComScore notes that Apple continues to gain ground as the leading U.S. smartphone OEM, but Samsung has seen the most explosive growth in this market over the past couple of years with a year-over-year increase of more than 100 percent and a two-year increase of more than 400 percent.
Smartphones have surpassed 125 million U.S. consumers, and tablets are now owned by more than 50 million.
