RESTON, VA. – Samsung remained the No. 1 cellphone brand used by U.S. wireless subscribers in the three-month period ending October, gaining less than a percentage point in share at expense of rivals LG, Motorola, and HTC, all of which lost share, ComScore found in its consumer surveys.
Apple also gained share and rose to the No. 2 spot for the first time, passing LG. Apple’s share rose 1.5 percentage points compared with Samsung’s 0.7 percent gain.
For the period, Samsung’s share rose to 26.3 percent, followed by Apple’s 17.8 percent, LG’s 17.6 percent, Motorola’s 11 percent, and HTC’s 6 percent.
The survey of more than 30,000 phone users also found that 121.3 million people ages 13 and older use smartphones, representing 51.9 percent of cellphone users, up 6 percentage points from July.
The survey also found that Android’s share of the smartphone market grew at a slightly faster pace than Apple’s share over the preceding quarter. Android’s share rose 1.4 percentage points to 53.6 percent, with Apple share rising 0.9 percentage points to 34.3 percent. The shares held by RIM, Symbian and Microsoft all slipped.
In measuring what people do with their phones, ComScore found that in the latest period, 75.9 percent of U.S. subscribers used text messaging, up 0.3 percentage points.
Downloaded applications were used by 54.5 percent of subscribers, rising 1.9 percentage points, while web browsers were used by 52.7 percent, up 1.5 percentage points. Accessing socialnetworking sites or blogs increased 1.5 percentage points to 39.4 percent of mobile subscribers. A total of 34.1 percent of mobile users, up 0.3 percentage points, played games on their phones, while 28.7 percent listened to music on their phones, up 0.4 percentage points.
