Google has shared the monthly Android distribution data, and if you had
money on Jelly Bean hitting the 10% mark, it's time to claim your share
of the winnings.
As per data released on 3 January 2013, Jelly Bean
now accounts for 10.2% of devices, with Ice Cream Sandwich (Android
4.0.x) now present on an impressive 29.1% of the devices. Gingerbread
(Android 2.x) is still going strong, but is finally below the 50% mark
for the first time since reaching that milestone.
Android 2.2 and
2.1 together stay above the 10% mark, at a combined marketshare of
11.4%, down from 13% last month. With no upgrade path for most of these
devices, the reduction is likely down to people finally ditching their
old devices in favour of new ones.
While Jelly Bean hitting 10%
mark may seem like good news, it's not all rosy if you look closer. With
Jelly Bean having come to represent two different Android versions -
Android 4.1 and Android 4.2 - there's further fragmentation, with
Android 4.1 accounting for 9% of the devices, while Android 4.2 being
present of 1.2%. In other words, hiding behind that over 10% figure for
Jelly Bean is the fact, that only 1.2% of Android devices are running
the latest Android version.
Contrast that with the iOS world,
where barely a week after iOS 6 was released, over 50% of iOS devices
worldwide were running the latest version of Apple's OS.