Smartphones using the Android platform boosted their US market share in recent months, extending their lead over Apple's iPhone, a new survey shows.
Android, the free mobile operating system from Google, accounted for 51.2 per cent of US smartphone sales in the three-month period ending in February, said the survey from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech.
Android added 5.9 percentage points from a year earlier, while Apple's share fell 3.5 points to 43.5 per cent.
Windows Phone, boosted by the new operating system introduced last year from Microsoft, increased its share to 4.1 per cent, according to the survey released Monday.
BlackBerry, which introduced a new smartphone platform in late January but started selling its new phones in the US market only in late March, saw its market share tumbled to just 0.7 per cent, the report showed.
Verizon was the top US carrier with 35 per cent of smartphones sold in the period, followed by AT&T (26.7 per cent) and Sprint (15 per cent).
Kantar analyst Mary-Ann Parlato said Samsung, the largest Android smartphone maker, has been continuing to rise, particularly among Sprint customers.
"Of those who changed their phone over the last year to a Samsung smartphone, 19 per cent had previously owned a Samsung feature phone, 15 per cent owned a HTC smartphone, 14 per cent owned an LG feature phone, 10 per cent owned a Samsung smartphone and nine per cent owned a BlackBerry," she said.
"It's apparent that Samsung is successful at capturing users from across the competitor set and not just gaining from their own loyalists."
