After Years Of Losses Apple Is Finally Clawing Back Some Market Share Against Android

Apple is fighting back against Android in the smartphone market in a big way.Kantar Worldpanel released new sales data that shows the iPhone 6 launch has given Apple's iOS mobile platform a massive step up in market share.Apple now accounts for 39.5% of British sales, its highest ever level. Across Europe, iOS is up by 5.7%.In the US, Apple gained 1.1 percentage points of share to claim 53.8% of the market.Even in China, where it has much less of an impact, Apple recorded a push. Sales there climbed by 0.2% to 15.7% ' modest, but significant. Apple has only paid attention to China for a year or so.Although Apple is arguably the coolest tech company on the planet, it is far from the most dominant in the smartphone market. Business Insider reported in August that IDC statistics showed iPhone's global market share slipped year-on-year to just 11.7%; Android rose to 84%. Apple is often the biggest brand in the big Western markets like the UK and the US. But not elsewhere ' Earth is largely an Android planet.In Spain, Android accounts for around 90% of the whole smartphone market. And while Apple deliberately pitches itself at the top end of the smartphone spectrum, the fact it only sells one out of every 10 phones there isn't good.But that's changing.As Business Insider predicted, the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus has forced the issue. Kantar Worldpanel explains that in the last three months up to October 31, Apple's market share increased nearly everywhere.Only Japan truly bucked the trend.Have a look at the figures:Dominic Sunnebo, strategic insight director at Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, comments: 'Apple has experienced a huge jump in sales share across almost all major markets thanks to the launch of the iPhone 6. In major European economies, the US and Australia, Apple's share of sales has risen. This success is particularly evident in Great Britain where Apple now has its highest ever share of sales with 39.5%. Most of these sales were driven by loyal Apple users. Some 86% of British buyers upgraded from an older iPhone model, only 5% switched across from Samsung.'One reason Android has taken a hit might be the poor performance of the Samsung Galaxy S5 ' a key player for the operating platform. Samsung's latest smartphone suffered sales 40% below the company's projections. The decline of the Galaxy S5 appears to have occurred in part because a huge number of consumers were waiting for iPhone 6. Those consumers seem to have eschewed the smaller screens of the iPhone 5C and 5S updates. Many of them went for the Galaxy S4 which remains a huge seller for Samsung. But iPhone 6 appears to have turned the market on its head and Apple is now reversing years of declines in market share. The situation got so bad that JK Shin, head of mobile, only narrowly escaped the chop, The Register notes. Android is still the market leader in smartphones. But see for yourself how Apple is making a huge comeback by clicking on Kantar's interactive map for country by country data.Join the conversation about this story
Click here to read full news..