I stumbled upon this piece below, and could not but wonder what the stats are like in Africa – Android and iOS App downloads. Well, in my opinion, the number of Android devices are way more than iOS devices on the continent, but to be sure, I contacted @Mister_Mobility and here’s what he said:
Yes, Android app downloads far exceed iOS in Africa. Android adoption & usage far outstrips iOS. Stats are not compiled yet but in bits.
I also asked him the reasons behind this, and although, I couldn’t get a response, I’d take a wild guess, and say Apple (since it’s the only product that uses the iOS), does not have as big a market here as Android – an OS for many manufacturers in the African mobile market.
Piece Starts Here
With Android accounting for the majority of smartphones worldwide at the moment, it’s finally also starting to become the most dominant player in apps, too.
Figures out today from analytics firm Xyologic note that Android now accounts for the majority of downloads in the UK, Germany and Russia, and predicts that the U.S. will be the next to go Google in either March or April. This is a sea change from months past, when Apple — the early mover in apps — has always dominated in app download activity, despite the fact that it has been trailing other platforms in terms of users.
Xyologic says that this now means that Android is dominating in nine different countries in app downloads, representing a mix of advanced and still-developing markets. In addition to the UK, Germany and Russia, Android became the dominant platform in Czech Republic, Poland and Portugal in August 2011; it took over in Brazil in October and Spain in November.
In all three markets named today, the gap between Apple and Android is fairly big: the UK had 90.9 million app downloads for iOS, with 99.1 million for Android. Germany say 59.5 million app downloads for iOS and 64.9 million on Android; and Russia had 38.4 million iOS downloads with 41.9 million for Android.
In terms of which apps fare the best: Xyologic says Facebook is still dominating as the most popular app in the UK, with 1.2 million downloads, with UK users in general favoring non-UK-specific apps. Of the top 100, in fact, only seven came from the UK market — within those, the Sky Sports Football app from broadcaster Sky was the most popular.
