BGR reports today on a new survey from ABI Research that shows that Android tablets have managed to wrestle 20% of the global tablet market away from Apple’s iron grip over the past year. However, while the Android OS as a whole has been very successful, ABI says that no one manufacturer in particular stands out as being capable of launching a “significant challenge” against the iPad.

“Many vendors have introduced media tablets, but none are separating themselves from the pack to pose a serious threat to Apple,” said ABI Research mobile devices group director Jeff Orr in a statement. “In fact, most have introduced products at prices higher than similarly configured iPads. Apple, never a company to be waiting for others, has introduced its second-generation iPad media tablet while keeping product pricing unchanged,” he added.

ABI said that fragmentation within operating system software is hindering the growth of the tablet market, noting that Google’s Android OS has “no less than three different software builds deployed across media tablets at the same time.” Of course this is something that Apple often likes to bang on about when comparing the iPad to other tablets.

Source: Android steals 20% of tablet market from iPad over past year

This article is correct if, and only if, one counts shipping numbers rather than sales numbers.

You have to really fudge the numbers to make this claim even a close one... Redefine the market. Redefine percentage to mean increased sakes percent growth and not actually the number of tablets in people's hands.

Really horrible bias reporting.

-t

I just got out of a meeting with some of our marketing guys, and one of them is paid to watch the mobile market very carefully to decide where to put our future hardware and design win efforts.

His latest numbers from third party analysts show total Android tablet sales of just over 1.2 million units. Compare that with the approximate 30 million iPads sold and you decide if Android has grabbed any reasonable market share...

To put it in perspective the Sega CD (anyone remember that one?) sold over 6M units in it's lifetime, and the Android tablet platform is still several years away from matching those figures.

Though I appreciate the competition, and think that a viable, healthy alternative to the iPad will only make the iPad and iOS better and better, the hype-reporters really do a disservice to the public when they spin the numbers to make it appear that any of the competitors have really more than scratched the surface with their offerings.

-t

but still ipad is the winner. we know that from the apple stock market prices.

All you media folks, talk like authority experts and have all your figures accurately identified. Truth is there is an iPad market, and the explosion shows it by the number of actual users of iPad and iPad2 and the production numbers are climbing.

As for Honeycomb, most of the numbers reports reflect (to my understanding) the number of units manufactured and are in the pipeline. Not the actual users. RIM has more than 40% return rate, and no one is reflecting that with Xoom, Samsung, HP, or any of the other wannbes. HP dropped their price permanently because of poor sales.

I tried to use an HP demo unit in a retail store the other day and had all kinds of difficulties. Not intuitive at all, and I am no dummy with computers. We have had our iPad2 since it was introduced and any one can pick it up and be comfortable using it immediately.

I object to your headlines. They are very misleading and very inaccurate. I know you want to be sensational ... but you are blowing your believability.

FWIW

Apple will always dominate the tablet Market, the would have the entire pie if they resolved any issues they have with Adobe regarding their Flash app; this said there are already hundreds of quick fix solutions out there without even having to invalidate warranties with jailbreak. Apple has always had the best graphics and that will never change. Other tablets band together and project market share as a group "android", were as apple will always stand alone and still manage to take the overall share by a significant margin.

The "Flash Dispute" cannot go on forever, this also seems to be the only selling point used by the other tablets out there. The notorious Blackberry tv campaign using the Flash Gordon theme tune just proves that this is the only advantage these other tablets have over the IPad. Taking that catchy theme tune away from the add and all the meaning behind it, all that's left is a run of the mill "attempt".

Sent from my iPad 2 16Gb 3G using iPF

Originally Posted by AvaMoore

Apple will always dominate the tablet Market, the would have the entire pie if they resolved any issues they have with Adobe regarding their Flash app; this said there are already hundreds of quick fix solutions out there without even having to invalidate warranties with jailbreak. Apple has always had the best graphics and that will never change. Other tablets band together and project market share as a group "android", were as apple will always stand alone and still manage to take the overall share by a significant margin.

The "Flash Dispute" cannot go on forever, this also seems to be the only selling point used by the other tablets out there. The notorious Blackberry tv campaign using the Flash Gordon theme tune just proves that this is the only advantage these other tablets have over the IPad. Taking that catchy theme tune away from the add and all the meaning behind it, all that's left is a run of the mill "attempt".

Sent from my iPad 2 16Gb 3G using iPF

The Flash argument is a funny one as no tablets have been able to use that technology to it's fullest... What they do not say is that they are able to run Flash, but just barely. Even Adobe haven't been able to solve the issue as Flash do require more resources than a tablet can actually provide.

VicoPad addict!

Even if the 20% market share would be users actually having an Android tablet in their hands, what is the actual market share of Samsung, HP or Acer? That's still 80% for one manufactuer which is just overwhelming...

Let's consider that the Android market would get to 80% market share... The 20% left would be Apple... That means that the 80% is composed of Samsung, Acer, Asus, Motorola, and a few others... If the major players of Android tablets have the same market share, that's 80% divided between them... 4 major players and the others, that's 80% / 5 = 16% of the market...

Even with just 20% of the market share, Apple would likely still be the first or at least second by comparing manufaturer's market share...


Would you compare Ford's cars against all other manufacturers combined?

VicoPad addict!

Originally Posted by DrHouse

The Flash argument is a funny one as no tablets have been able to use that technology to it's fullest... What they do not say is that they are able to run Flash, but just barely. Even Adobe haven't been able to solve the issue as Flash do require more resources than a tablet can actually provide.

VicoPad addict!

Exactly! I actually only really use flash for watching megavideos which can easily be done on the iPad, most flash sites offer a non-flash alternative in most cases. I rarely need the program for anything else.

Sent from my iPad 2 16Gb 3G using iPF