Apple iOS Still Kicking Android Butt In Terms Of Mobile Usage, Study Finds

We’ve heard it a million times, and yet another study claims that Apple’s iOS still beats the better selling Google Android OS in terms of overall web usage.

The analytics guru’s at Piper Jaffray studied US mobile web traffic in April 2013 and found that iOS controls a 69 percent market share, up from 66.4 percent in March 2013.

The Jaffray study also finds that Google Android now commands a 28.7 percent market share for web usage, up from 26.5 percent in March 2013.

According to Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster:

“For the second straight month in our tracking of the data, iOS gained on Android as a source of mobile traffic. We believe the traffic data continues to demonstrate that iOS is not only the leading platform in the US, its users are generally more engaged with their mobile devices.”

Munster examined traffic from the following 10 mobile websites: Answers.com, Tumblr, ChaCha, Examiner, LinkedIn, Bleacher Report, Hubpages, White Pages, Squidoo, and Dictionary.com.

The final result was simple: Apple and Google are gaining ground at the expense of Windows Phone, BlackBerry, and other mobile platforms. The study found that other mobile platforms have fallen from 4.9 percent market share to 4.5 percent.

Interestingly, the study found that the usage gap between iPhone and iPad users has continued to shrink. While iPhone users represented 60.3 percent of traffic in March 2013 and iPad users represented just 39.7 percent of the company’s mobile web traffic, the iPad jumped to 41.7 percent in April 2013.

With more Android devices appearing on the market every week and Apple shares slipping, the remainder of 2013 will be an interesting time for investigating Apple’s shrinking stranglehold on the mobile market.