Deeper Dive on Android vs iOS Web Usage

I gave a brief overview of my thoughts on global web usage in the Tech.pinions Insider weekly newsletter that goes out each weekend. But I wanted to dive into a few more points I think are interesting.

When it comes to the business model of so many companies in the smartphone, tablet, and PC market, usage is an essential metric. For online companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, app vendors, and more, web usage or the extent to which one gets on and uses the Internet is even more essential. What we are seeing is the early signs of the problems connecting the next billion customers for many companies. For a long time, iOS dominated Android as a whole in terms of web usage. Interestingly, an online metrics service I track points out this specifically in their FAQ on their site.

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Android ships in larger quantities, but iOS dominates usage. Point number two is perhaps the most insightful. Not only are iPhones typically supplied with generous data plans but they are purchased by people who can afford to liberally use the web. Someone who can afford a $500 or higher phone in non-subsidesd markets can also afford a premium tier data plan. I’ve started using the term “data budget” to describe this. iPhone users have a higher data budget than the average Android user. Another point is broadband is not equal in many parts of the world. Many emerging markets have spotty and slow broadband. It makes the web challenging at times due to the lack of speed. These are part of the complexities I feel led to Android taking so long to pass iOS in terms of web usage, despite having more than double the usage base for quite a while.

While I recognize the disparity in methodologies of StatCounter and NetMarket Share,  I still find them both useful. StatCounter, measures total usage of a user and will count the same user as a page view every time that person views a website they track. That is why StatCounter has Android ahead of iOS in web usage and says it has been for some time.

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StatCounter’s data will favor the heavier of web users, thus their data will give us a broader picture of how active on the web each platform may be. But it is also skewed toward the top percentage of users who more liberally use the web. It leads us to the conclusion that the Android data collected by StatCounter is likely heavily influenced by those Android users who are more like iPhone users in terms of disposable income, data budget, quality of connectivity, etc. That point is well understood when we look at the device vendor breakdown of StatCounters data. We see Samsung users have been driving the bulk of Android’s global web browsing in their network of sites. Samsung’s premium and mid-tier devices would have similar users where usage would be impacted.

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NetMarketShare presents a different picture and for different reasons. NetMarketShare only counts each user once per day on their network of sites, so we get a bit more holistic view of platform usage which is not skewed by the power users of either platform.

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One thing to point out on this chart is it is measuring absolute share. iOS’ line is not going down because iOS is being used less, only because Android is growing as a percentage of overall web traffic on their network.

It was inevitable Android would pass iOS in terms of overall usage. What this brings up though is the striking point that usage is not equal between the two platforms per users. Meaning the average iOS consumer will still use dramatically more Internet services than your average Android user. Given the many points I’ve made before that Google’s Android already has the heaviest web users and the most profitable customers to their ecosystem as they are ever going to get, the longer term trend is problematic to their growth if it remains solely tied to usage of Internet services. The same is true of Facebook. In both cases the next billion will have a lower data budget, less reliable and likely slower connectivity and will have to prioritize that data budget accordingly. In short, this next billion will prioritize survival over entertainment. They will likely use a messaging service like WhatsApp because that is how their commerce or trade gets done. That is a worthwhile spend of data budget. Those needs will trump entertainment for the foreseeable future.

While looking at iOS vs Android web usage is helpful, it is really still only part of the story. I track a range of developer toolsets that show web usage by particular devices as well. Often many of these include app usage as well since most of these analytics services are for app developers. Here are a few select countries of interest because they are big but also because they qualify as those I consider with a stringent data budget.

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All this does is emphasize in countries where the iPhone has a presence, even if only small, those users dominate the usage the landscape and often by a healthy margin.

Take Aways

What is becoming increasingly clear to me is at a platform level, the opportunity within iOS and Android for app developers, providers of web services or services in general, are simply different on each platform. You could make the argument the opportunity within iOS is very different than the opportunity within the Android ecosystem. Thus, each ecosystem may have an entirely different set of developers, services providers, and more.

For a more detailed view of this angle, listen to the latest podcast with myself and Andreessen Horowitz partner and analyst Benedict Evans on our latest mobile focused Tech.pinions Podcast.

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Ben Bajarin

Ben Bajarin is a Principal Analyst and the head of primary research at Creative Strategies, Inc - An industry analysis, market intelligence and research firm located in Silicon Valley. His primary focus is consumer technology and market trend research and he is responsible for studying over 30 countries. Full Bio

6 thoughts on “Deeper Dive on Android vs iOS Web Usage”

  1. There’s a flip side to that “data budget”: Android users have a higher “no-data budget”, because of SD cards. I can keep myself entertained for weeks off my $40 64GB SD. Most iPhone users have the basic 16GB model, with almost 0 space left for media after the OS and apps take their share, and *have* to take to the internet to entertain themselves.

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