Ranking cell phone companies is a tough thing to do. Some of these companies have a bunch of popular handsets, whilst others have just one or two yet manage to sell as many or more. Rank the companies by cumulative sales across all of their lines and the results will swing one way; rank them model-by-model, and they might look completely different.
Such is the case with the iPhone, according to the latest numbers from The Nielsen Company. While RIM’s marketshare with their BlackBerry line is still nearly double that of Apple’s, the iPhone has now surpassed everything else to become the most popular phone in the US.
The iPhone’s lead is fairly tight, coming in at 4.0% of all mobile phone owners while the BlackBerry 8300 series follows closely behind at 3.7%. The rest of the list is made up primarily of feature phones, outside of appearances by the BlackBerry Storm and the BlackBerry 8100 series in 7th and 10th respectively. As the iPhone 3GS doesn’t make an individual appearance on the list, we’re assuming that they’ve combined the 3G and 3GS into one product line.
![Screen shot 2009-12-22 at [ December 22 ] 10.53.00 AM](http://www.mobilecrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/Screen-shot-2009-12-22-at-December-22-10.53.00-AM.png "Screen shot 2009-12-22 at [ December 22 ] 10.53.00 AM")
A few more interesting tidbits gleaned from the Nielsen report:
- The most popular reason people pick pre-paid phones isn’t because the lack of contract — that’s actually #4 — but because the plans are more straightforward. It’s followed by “No monthly bills” and “Emergency use only”.
- 21% of households now use mobile phones only, with no land line to call their own. This is up from 15% in 2006
- 15% of households now own at least one smartphone
Too bad it doesn’t have a keyboard. I’m happy with my Curve till the Droid is available north of the 49th parallel.
it also has the most fanboys. no suprise here.
You think that’s because it’s the best phone? Dummy
+1
iPhone the best all-around mobile device? Errr… I think it’s been fairly well established that that’s not the case. It’s the world’s best mobile internet device, right? It sucks as a phone, it can’t multi-task, no Flash support, battery life sucks, etc.
I thought all that was sort of a given at this point.
Like it or not, iPhone is *the* device of the decade. Period. Accept it and move on. And oh, I hope that the iPhone NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, EVER gets Flash. Never ever.
Actually, no, that would be the iPod.
kiss off douche boy
‘Keyboard or not’, you can’t deny the tremendous contribution iPhone gave to US and to the rest of the world. A real game changer indeed, Perhaps after this decade there will be a new gadget, but still the iPhone glory will be etch to people.
Perhaps the droid onslaught will be the next? http://bit.ly/motorola-droid-intro-and-caveats
Keyboards in phones are overrated…
Touch screen is cool…
that’s for sure!
The iPhone has far less fanboys than it has morons pointlessly ragging on it every time anyone publishes a story about smart phones.
It’s not perfect, you don’t have to buy it if you don’t like it, move along.
plusONE!
i agree with you fanboy
Huh? What’s north of the 49th parallel? ;-)
This dominance is well reflected by the reviews we’ve been getting on our site baduku.com. When the Droid came out I thought we would be getting a bunch of avid droid defender coming to the defense of Droid and giving it raving reviews but that wasn’t the case. If the thousands of views the Droid thus far has only gotten 3 reviews, yet the iphone has garnered 8 reviews.
I think that this reflects a very important distinction between Google, Apple, Microsoft and Rim. I personally think that Apple and Microsoft have an established culture that garners with it passionate fans. People like Google, and they may use Google apps like search, reader, mail etc more daily than they do any Apple of Microsoft application, however, they aren’t fans, they won’t defend Google to the nth degree. Maybe they thing Google is so huge it doesn’t need defending. Thus far the only true fanatical support for Droid has been from people who just plain hate Apple and Microsoft.
I guess my point is Google needs to find a way to create a fan base to match the likes of Apple and Microsoft, if it intends on employing the same kind of enthusiasm in bright reviews and devoted defense.
Check out our section on cell phones for more reviews of many of these phone models and add some of your opinions to the list.
http://www.baduku.com/category/Cell-Phones
I love the Droid, but when I’m up for a new phone I buy whatever is the best available. Although Andriod will have a distinct advantage since I love this phone.
It’s a little early to be waiting for devout Android users since there weren’t a lot of them. That’s going to change over the next 12 months.
4% is ‘dominant’?
My word. What a strange world you live in.
No it’s not dominant. ‘Dominate’ doesn’t appear in this article, just ‘most popular’ according to this article
The headline is disingenuous.
Even accounting for the ranking difficulty as you notem why is It is ok to combine the models of iphone as one ( “As the iPhone 3GS doesn’t make an individual appearance on the list, we’re assuming that they’ve combined the 3G and 3GS into one product line”) but Blackberry models market share should be split ?
Anything to put the iphone on top ?
Relax buddy… The BB 8300 is 5 different models tallied as 1, and yes those models are differentiated by features, not just carriers. Take a deep breath, and think to yourself: “What does The Nielsen Company have to gain by doing anything to put the iPhone on top?”
+1
How can an article that states that the statistics can be skewed in many directions – and, clearly states that Blackberry/combined has the smart phone lead, also include this false headline?
Someone looking for a job writing a half-term ex-governor from AK’s FB headlines?
Apple has always hovered around 4% of the computer market; now they have 4% of the phone market. That is who they are. What’s astonishing is that Blackberry/8300 is nearly at the same level, for a boring old worker-bee phone…
“Popular” needs a whole lot more than 4% to live up to the notion of “pop.”
I’ll have to give cudos to Apple for the domination with a single device, but ideal if we talk about leaders in the mobile market, BlackBerry (combined) is still the biggest in the Smart Phone arena if you add up those percentages.
I think we all understand that, Kev.
But this is about the most popular phone.
kev, shut yo dummazz up
How long has BB been around vs the iPhone?
And Nokia N900 is the best, but not so popular…
And only works fully on t-mobile which has very spotty 3G coverage.
> And Nokia N900 is the best
There’s no such things as “the best phone”.
That’s like saying “the best car”, “the best house”, “the best TV”, “the best coffee”.
There’s no such thing. Everyone has a long list of different needs/desires.
yes there is
the best phone: Motorola StarTAC
the best house: Season 3: HALF-WIT- A brain-damaged music savant (Special Guest Star Dave Matthews) has seizures despite being on anti-seizure medications, while everyone is shocked to learn that House has entered himself for brain cancer treatment.
the best TV: Pioneer Elite PRO-111FD
the best coffee: Alterra French Roast
These are the best and no one can refute them!
oh, I forgot, the best car: 1995 Chevy Cavalier
from what I see … blackberry is the most popular phone out there not the iphone….. just saying
Ricky, there is 1 problem with what you’re saying; have a look at the table up there
Ricky is right.
See table.
not on the chat dumazz
*chart
But the iPhone isn’t a single device. It’s 3.
yeah righht n00bcycle
And the Blackberry 8300 isn’t a single device. It’s 5.
FTFY
I do not see one single Android device.
cuz no one has one baiotch
Watch your language MF
get bent.
I have one. I have the Eris and I would not trade it for an iPhone ever. It is fast, smooth, and fits well in my pocket.
It has great 3g coverage, the wifi rocks, and it plays flash content. It is everything I wanted in a mobile device and then some.
Id give the android a year or so now thats it is out a real network (not tmobile) and see how the stats look.
Android is just an operating system, not a device.
That’s why he said ‘Android device’.
Oh man. The comprehension on display in this thread is horrendous
wow, you are really smart. :-)
Erm, fail.
Android by any other name, still sucks.
Its just amazing how a single company has so much creative power so swallow all the big boys with one single device.
If 4% = Swallowing the Big Boys, well…
…it must take much for your to choke?
Apple fanbois are use to thinking 4% market share is being #1 at something.
When a company enters a market thats already dominated by long time big players (Nokia, Samsung, Motorola, RIM) and takes the spotlight in a heart beat, that says something about their creative power. Also its not about the 4 %, its about 4% in 2 short years and the most popular device! Take what you want from this, but its pretty damn clear ;)
I like Google’s G1, but the G1 has no enterprise WPA2 for university use UI, so I have to consider IPhone.
I have an Eris. I run wpa2 enterprise at work and wpa2 personal at home and my android eris works awesome with it. At home my phone loads pages on wireless as fast or faster than my PC.
Why not use correct terms like “most popular *PHONE*” or “most popular model-line”.
(They are very different things.)
This is a bullshit report.
No way does th eiPhone beat out all those $40 phones that sells billions a year.
This is just some smartphone report not a real mobile phone report.
Clean up your fanboi post, iPhone is the most popular SMART phone in the US.. you make it seem like 100 million people buy iPhone a year… wake up.
Imagine how many phones Apple could sell if you could get it from a good carrier?
You know one that doesn’t drop half their calls.
But that Luke Wilson guy says AT&T’s network is really great. The TV don’t lie man!!!
You start out saying it’s difficult to put this sort of table together, that different assumptions or methodology can result in wildly different answers. I agree.
But having said that, you fail to provide little more than speculation on how this table was produced, rendering it basically useless.
So what was the point? Another puerile fanboi v not fanboi debate?
Ok – if you can aggregate the 3G and 3Gs together… then let’s aggregate the others by company too.. in which case, the two RIMs together = 6.3% and the four LGs (all running BREW) = 6.4%.
So, by this logic, the MOST popular phone runs a proprietary OS with no app store.
the article is grouped by product lines, not by company. the iphone product line sells the 3g and 3gs. duh.
People still buy the Motorola Razr in the US? Crazy!!
It may not the best or the most popular phone. But, then, it brought a revolution with its TouchScreen. So much so, that the touchscreen of every new device is being compared to it, making it a some sort of standard. Too bad, I am in India, where there isn’t 3G yet and wireless internet burns a hole in the pockets.
Yes nikhil
still there are multi round negotiations going on n on n on…
India may expect on mid of next year while Europe is talking about 4G
Hi
Is iphone is really worth?
thanks,
Ram
In 2009 iPhone did really well, but i can see that Android is getting good popularity and it can create some serious issues to iPhone in 2010.
The iPhone’s lead is fairly tight, coming in at 4.0% of all mobile phone owners while the BlackBerry 8300 series follows closely behind at 3.7%.
AGREE.
Which is the prepaid one?
G1 is also good smartphone until it supports the WIFI
WPA2 Enterprise. Right now, no one is responsible for the WPA2. Iphone has WPA2, so it seems more popular than G1
People still buy the Motorola Razr in the US?