Android fragmentation: less than 3% on Google’s latest, most devices on two-year old software, not the case with Apple products

by Antonio Wells Nov 2, 2012 8:28 AM – 7 Comments

It saddens me every month to report the outrageous level of fragmentation with Android platform versions. Although we do not have the exact percentages, Apple did recently announce there are more than 200 million iOS 6 devices, this just a month after releasing the update. Just as many phones are being upgraded to Android 4+(Ice Cream Sandwich) at 25.8% from majority leader Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) at 54.2%, Google has since released Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean) with a spec of dust marketshare at 2.7%. The launch of Google’s new Nexus phone and tablet introduces Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean), which are not factored into the figures below as those devices won’t be available until November 13th (stats below reflect data collected by Google during two weeks ending on November 1). See full stats below:

Android Platform Versions 11-2012

Android Platform Historical Data 11-2012

Platform	API Level	Codename	Distribution
Android 4.1	16	Jelly Bean	2.7%
Android 4.0.3 - Android 4.0.4	15	Ice Cream Sandwich	25.8%
Android 3.1 -Android 3.2	12-13	Honeycomb	1.8%
Android 2.3 - Android 2.3.7	9-10	Gingerbread	54.2%
Android 2.2	8	Froyo	12%
Android 2.1	7	Eclair	3.1%
Android 1.6	4	Donut	0.3%
Android 1.5	3	Cupcake	0.1%

Data collected during two weeks ending on November 1, 2012

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We’ve also been keeping historical track of Android OS saturation in the market, check out the links below to see how Android has rapidly grown:

[Via Android Platform Versions]

Tags: Android 2.1, Android 2.2, Android 2.3, Android 2.3.3, Android 3.0, Android 4.0, Android 4.1, Android 4.2, Android Fragmentation, Android Platform Versions, Android Statistics, Android Stats, Android Tablets, Froyo, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, ICS, Jelly Bean, Poor Android Tablet Sales

Categorised in: Android Advice, Featured, News

7 Comments

By roofuskit on November 2, 2012 at 1:47 pm:

I’m sorry, but this whining gets old. Most Android users don’t know, and don’t care about fragmentation. There’s fragmentation on Apple’s products as they cut out features on older ones. And on Android many new features are easily obtained on older versions through apps.

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- By Antonio Wells on November 2, 2012 at 1:51 pm:
  
  @roofuskit Totally agreed about whining about it. However, before the latest version has a chance of releasing to the masses, Google is already 1-2 releases ahead i.e. with ICS
  
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By Dave on November 2, 2012 at 5:21 pm:

When publishing Android fragmentation figures it is meaningless to include non-Nexus devices. This is doubly true if you want to compare the figures with iOS.

If you are going to include non-Nexus devices in your figures you need to then also compare the number of non-Apple devices running iOS with the number of non-Nexus devices running Android.

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- By Antonio Wells on November 2, 2012 at 6:24 pm:
  
  @Dave Maybe it’s a few typos but your comments make absolutely no sense. Most Nexus devices make up majority of that 2.7% of Jelly Bean stats. Therefore, according to your suggestion, we should exclude 97.3% of Android devices because they’re non-Nexus??? Lastly, and maybe I’m missing something major here, but what non-Apple device is running iOS?
  
  Reply
  - By Dave on November 2, 2012 at 8:26 pm:
    
    My point is that google have no control over the Android images that are created by phone manufacturers by forking vanilla Android.
    
    Apple however are the only source of iOS – so to compare fragmentation of iOS and Android you need to compare like with like. That is, you need to compare devices running the google supplied Android with the Apple supplied iOS. That means you must compare fragmentation of Android on nexus devices with fragmentation of iOS devices.
    
    My point about non-Apple devices running iOS was to further illustrate the point. There are no non-Apple devices running iOS. According to your figure, 97.3% of Android devices are non-Nexus. That is 97.3% of Android devices upon which google has no control over fragmentation.
    
    Comparing fragmentation figures between Android and iOS without excluding those devices is pointless.
    
    Reply
By Bradley on November 7, 2012 at 7:15 pm:

OEMs and carriers are the ones to blame. I most times wish Google would set hardware guidelines so that the devices will be able to function smoothly on the latest software. I also wish Google would push the updates themselves. But if that happens, it will upset their partners. But when you have carriers deciding whether or not to push the update because of compatibility with their bloatware, or OEMs making devices that will be obsolete within a year, or just choosing not to update because they want newer devices to sell, it’s just sad.

I guess that’s where the Nexus line comes in, where Google can be like Apple, control the hardware and the software, no carrier bloatware or OEMs fancy skins, just a pure and wonderful Google experience.

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By Shaun on November 25, 2012 at 5:16 pm:

I think its absolutely pointless to show fragmentation at all for Android devices. Most apps work with all phones 2.1 and higher. Thats right, most apps. There are few apps that still go all the way back to 1.6 (which thats only .6% of the android community). You can say its a pain for developers to develop for so many different screens and hardware, but its really not. The API/SDK is written in such a way that it scales, as long as you take the time to make hi-res and low-res graphics and put them into the correct folder. Now, look at Apple on the other hand. All Apple 4 apps that havent been upgraded leave a nice black border on two sides of the phone because they added .5 inches to the new screen, and most new apps wont run on the old iPhone 3. Now, tell me whos really fragmented? Atleast the Android API makes up for it with making the app fit the whole screen. Plus, why complain about fragmentation at all? We have been dealing with it for the last 20+ years on computers. Newer software general requires newer hardware. Same with video game consoles, TV’s, etc. The only reason people bring this up is because its the only thing Apple can spin off on android. ‘Fragmentation’. Its nothing new, and really Android did a great job preparing for it.

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