Nearly 79 percent of all smartphones shipped in 2013 ran Android; iOS a distant second

Android and iOS accounted for 95.7% of all smartphone shipments in the fourth quarter of 2013, and for 93.8% of all smartphone shipments in 2013, revealed IDC’s latest Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker report. While Apple’s OS was seen in more than 153 million smartphones, it was Android that led the way as it was the OS on 78.6% of all smartphones shipped last year.   Needless to say, Samsung took the top slot in terms of the vendors with 39.5% share of shipments for the year. The research firm suggests that once Lenovo acquires Motorola, it could replace Huawei who enjoyed the second position among Android vendors in 2013.  “Clearly, there was strong end-user demand for both Android and iOS products during the quarter and the year,” says Ramon Llamas, Research Manager with IDC’s Mobile Phone team.   “What stands out are the different routes Android and Apple took to meet this demand. Android relied on its long list of OEM partners, a broad and deep collection of devices, and price points that appealed to nearly every market segment. Apple’s iOS, on the other hand, relied on nearly the opposite approach: a limited selection of Apple-only devices, whose prices trended higher than most. [caption id=“attachment_218199” align=“aligncenter” width=“640”]  Top Five Smartphone Operating Systems, Shipments, and Market Share, 2013 (units in millions)[/caption]   While Samsung led the race of Android-based devices, it was followed by companies such as Huawei, LG, Lenovo, Coolpad, and Sony. On the other hand, iOS witnessed the lowest positive growth in the last quarter by 6.7% as well as the year by 12.9%. Though it is quite popular in the smartphone market, the company has been criticised for not offering a new low-cost iPhone or a large screen iPhone in 2013. However, reports claim that the next-gen iPhone will come with a **larger 4.8-inch display** .   Windows Phone showed the largest increase in the user base in the last quarter as well as last year. The user base grew by 46.7% in the last quarter and by 90.9% in 2013. Unsurprisingly, Nokia is the leading vendor for WP with 89.3% market share, thanks largely due to budget offerings such as the **Lumia 520** and **Lumia 525** .   BlackBerry was the only operating system that saw negative year-over-year change both for the quarter and for the year. It witnessed a drop of 77.0% for the last quarter and 40.9% for the year. The new leadership and management, and a tighter focus on the enterprise market may help place Blackberry in a better position this year, says the report.