Windows Phone beats BLACKBERRY in mobe OS popularity stakes

The difference is small, and they are both way behind the leaders, but online data analytics specialists comScore have reported that while usage of Windows Phone stayed steady as a rock at 3.2 per cent, BlackBerry slipped half a percent down at 3.1 per cent. This puts Windows in third place, behind Apple (at 41.7 per cent) and …

[James 51]

Was looking at phone contracts recently and its hard to believe but the 1020 is marginally cheaper than a Z30 on a two year contract.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet the Z30 is so much better.

[Anonymous Coward]

technically...

.... it's 0.1 worse.

[Anonymous Coward]

I assume that's a joke. The 1020 is a notably better handset. Better camera, better flash, better touch panel, lighter, better mics, better maps / nav, more memory, etc, etc.

[big_D]

The 1020 is a lovely device. I bought one from Amazon this week, unbranded. Very happy with it.

Also bought a 620 for my other half, she wanted a small phone.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd say it's more about BB being toxic and people jumping to WP than anything else.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep - Windows Phone has a 17% and rising share of the UK enteprise market...

Not surprising really - easy to integrate and manage, more secure than the alternatives, relatively cheap handset options and comes with cut down Office versions...

[Gerhard den Hollander]

care to back up your claim that winpho is actually more secure than the alternatives ?

[Anonymous Coward]

"care to back up your claim that winpho is actually more secure than the alternatives ?"

IOS 7 - already 37 vulnerabilities - and hundreds in previous versions: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/48169/

Blackberry OS 10 - 31 vulnerabilities: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/45971/

Android - a number of known vulnerabilities in Chrome Android browser + Android OS (no unified total that I can find, but definately more than WP)

Windows Phone 8 - Zero vulnerabilities to date: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/48250/

Windows Phone 7 - 2 (very minor) vunerabilities to date: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/33401/

[Levente Szileszky]

"UK enteprise market"

A what...? Can you be more vague...?

OTOH I bet if we look into 'Office-capable Nigerian enterprise smartphone market' we will also find very high percentage...

"Not surprising really "

Ahahaha, you anonymous MSFT trolls are soo hilarious with your BS claims - and pushing security and Office immediately give you away, pal - nobody ever thinks of those two things when it comes to WinPho, that's for sure. :)

[TheVogon]

"A what...? Can you be more vague...?"

I think the poster was a bit vague. It is in fact Nokia Windows Phones that have a 17% share of the UK enterprise market - as per the Mobile World Congress 2014. Not exactly shocking as WP has an 11% share of the European Market now:

http://www.nokiapoweruser.com/2014/02/24/kwps-january-report-windows-phone-at-10-in-eu-5-in-us-17-in-italy-ios-loses-everywhere/

"pushing security and Office immediately give you away, pal - nobody ever thinks of those two things when it comes to WinPho, that's for sure. :)"

They certainly do in the Enterprise market versus Blackberry. You give yourself away as clearly someone not senior enough to have been involved in such decision making processes...

[Chemist]

"You give yourself away as clearly someone not senior enough to have been involved in such decision making processes..."

You give yourself away as clearly someone who would be like to be thought senior enough to have been involved in such decision making processes... - fixed that

[auburnman]

I would prefer Pandora over Spotify too if it was still easily available over here. The whole music genome thing was really could at predicting music I'd want to listen to.

[sabroni]

Horses for courses

I thought the music genome thing was misguided, and it didn't seem to work for me. They specify things like gender of lead vocalist, level of distortion on the electric guitar, type of background vocals. "You like a tune with a male vocalist and that level of distortion, here's another one." Kind of like saying "You enjoyed a film with lots of orange colours and slow panning shots, here's another one."

[JDX]

US only

The US market is very different from European markets - Apple share is disproportionately large and I suspect WP is disproportionately small... both by a factor of two maybe?

[Flocke Kroes]

Re: US only

You can find world wide figures here:

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2014/02/final-2013-smartphone-market-share-numbers-full-year-and-quarterly-q4-data-by-top-10-brands-plus-os-.html

Apple's installed base is 21%, so they do far better in the US than in the rest of the world. WP is 3% in the US and in the whole of the world. Europe has been a difficult market for WP, in part because of retaliation for the destruction of Nokia. WP does well in the bargain bins of the third world where unwanted phones are disposed of. The odd thing is Symbian, with 5% world wide market share, but not showing up in the US figures.

Nokia has given a clear statement about the future of WP: they released three new Android phones.

Linux on Azure. Android on phones from Microsoft's Nokia. Is it time to say Microsoft Linux has arrived, or should we wait for Steam on XBox?

[JDX]

Re: US only

Of course MS isn't going to drop WP8 anytime soon. It's arguably their best OS.

The Nokia Android models are replacing the Nokia feature/dumbphone ranges like Asha. Bottom end.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: US only

"Nokia has given a clear statement about the future of WP: they released three new Android phones."

Nokia won't be making that decision - that division are being purchased by Microsoft. Who seeing as they get royalties from Android sales might not have an issue with a selling a low end OS in Android on one hand and Windows Phone as a premium option on the other. Windows Phone's over 100% YoY growth says that Microsoft are unlikely to drop it any time soon.

"Linux on Azure"

Microsoft have always done their best to support migrations from legacy UNIX type OSs. Hence partly why they have 75% of the Server market.

[AMBxx]

Question on BES

If your BB is connected via BES, and is just used for corporate email and phone calls, would it appear in the stats?

[Nick]

weather channel?

I would have thought that its presence is due to every smartphone that I've ever encountered having an oversized weather applet on the home screen. How many people never get around for removing it?

[Anonymous Coward]

My Brother in Law

Had his Z10 stolen, it was returned 10 minutes later.

Ta dum.

[Anonymous Coward]

I own a lumia 920

Lovely phone.

Has the vast majority of functions i need and a lot of decent apps (lot of crap ones too but doesn't every platform) to fulfill the functions it doesnt have and the raft of forthcomning updates will likely address those issues.

Quite happy with it.

[Abacus]

Re: I own a lumia 920

I kind of rotate between IOS, Android, and WP on a two monthly or quarterly basis, whenever I get bored. Of the 3, I prefer WP for pretty much everything, except one thing...

The stock music player stinks, and all Marketplace music apps are even worse.

The basic problem is that every time you go into a WP music app, it wants to reindex the music library. I have 8000 tunes on a 64GB sd card, and its a real hassle.

Hoping this is fixed in 8.1. I'll have way less incentive to go back to the GS3 or the iPhone.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I own a lumia 920

Good for you, hope it goes with the plastic knob you enjoy fiddling with.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I own a lumia 920

"Quite happy with it."

So was I until I got a Lumia 925. Slimmer, better camera, screen and battery life....

[Semtex451]

Tributes

"hardly anything for Microsoft to crow about and it's still bobbing along"

I'm enjoying these mini-tributes to Bob Crow, each one reminds me, and brings a little smile.

[Longrod_von_Hugendong]

Nokia Screens...

Burn in like the devil, have you seen them in the shops... not good.

[Fihart]

Re: Nokia Screens... @Longrod_von_Whatever

Those are the fake ones they put on display !!

[Tyrion]

Hollow Victory

> Windows Phone beats BLACKBERRY

Isn't that what's commonly called a hollow victory considering that between them they constitute only 6.3% of the market? The fact that Windoze Phone actually lost marketshare in Q4 2013 suggests it's actually reached its peak despite Nokia virtually giving away 520's and other low end phones in Asia and Europe.

[Mage]

Re: Hollow Victory

yes, considering Blackberry / RIM may be doomed.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Hollow Victory

"The fact that Windoze Phone actually lost marketshare in Q4 2013 "

No it didnt. Windows Phone sales as a percentage of market share are up QoQ and YoY.

Are you confusing the fact that NOKIA shipped fewer devices in Q4 (presumably because they already stuffed the channel to rip the best price out of Microsoft) ?

[Tommy Pock]

All the snidey comments aside:

This is just as exciting as the time in the mid 80s when the Lada Riva was outselling the FSO Polonez 3 to 1

[Big_Ted]

My 2 cents worth

tried iPhone a couple of years ago, didn't like it as it was just too small for me (Big thumbs and bad eyes.)

Switched to Android and was happy for a couple of years but decided to try something different so got a Nokia 520, loved most things about it except the battery and lack of a few apps.

Have now got a 920 and its great , I needed a backup phone anyway so I thought I would try BB10, bought the Z10 and I love it, everything I want to run just does fast and easy.

So for everyday txt / email and phone I use the BB, for browser etc I use the 920. Its horses for cources and if you are into lots of txt and social media etc BB10 just works so well.

[Terry Barnes]

Given that this research tracks usage, and given Blackberry's huge lead from phones already sold and in use, I think that means a pretty dramatic surge in the uptake of Windows Phone. To go from zero and then overtake Blackberry's install base is quite a feat.

Anecdotally, I'm seeing lots of WP use. I've got one, as has my wife. My father-in-law and brother-in-law have them, our babysitter and the two people I share a desk with. In fact, everyone I know personally who has bought a smartphone in the past six months has bought Windows Phone.