Jelly Bean running on nearly 60 percent of Android devices as KitKat adoption grows

Google has released its official distribution numbers for Android’s versions for the month of December and it has been revealed that Jelly Bean is still raking in the big numbers for the operating system. Taking all three instances of Jelly Bean’s release, the version is currently running on nearly 60 percent of all Android devices across the world.

Android version 4.1 Jelly Bean is still holding fort as the most used version of the OS at 35.9 percent, followed by version 4.2 Jelly Bean at 15.4 percent. Version 4.3 Jelly Bean is still at the lowest level of the three with merely 7.8 percent of devices signing in on this version.

The latest version of Android, 4.4 KitKat, has shown a slight jump in devices from being installed on 1.1 percent last month to 1.4 percent devices this month. Even while this growth is slow, it’s only because a lot of phones, eligible to get on to KitKat are still stuck on Jelly Bean. Nexus and Motorola devices have thus far been able to take advantage of the newer Android 4.4.

As far as other versions of Android go, Gingerbread’s popularity is slowly yet steadily shrinking, but it’s still holding its own with 21.2 percent of all Android devices running the ultra-popular version 2.3. Ice Cream Sandwich, on the other hand, is now on 16.9 percent of all devices. Android version 2.2 Froyo and 3.2 Honeycomb total up to merely 1.4 percent of the Android distribution chart.

Of course, what must be kept in mind is that this chart only consists of devices that are working on any version after Froyo, including the version 2.2 as well. This is because the older versions are not able to support the newer Google Play Store and the company can thus not calculate the hits from older models.

With more manufacturers expected to push out KitKat updates in the coming months, we should be seeing the version’s share rise in the pie soon. This, however, will come at the expense of current leader Jelly Bean more than any other version.