Smartphones become an important part of our lives without us even realizing that. The first mobile phones started being manufactured in 1990’s. Most of them were big, black & white and resistant. As the years passed, the technology evolved. The first coloured mobile phone was the Sanyo SCP-5000.
The Sanyo SCP-5000 was the actual grandpa of smartphones. And since then, technology evolved that we have new & improved phones monthly. But one of the most important things is the operating system of a phone. There are two big players here: Android and Apple. And Android is winning. But it wasn’t like that.
A small history on mobile operating systems
At first, there was PalmOS. A really old operating system, but it was the first usable mobile operating system. Then, Symbian appeared and won the market. In 1999, Symbian had 0.71% of the market. By 2004, they were owning 50% of the market. The top value they had was around 61-62% in 2007.
Symbian was more reliable than PalmOS. And more user friendly. But unfortunately, it wasn’t user friendly enough. The engineers focused on improving the hardware and they ignored what their audience wanted – a better UI. That’s why iOS, Blackberry OS and Android started winning field. They started winning so much field, that by 2013 Symbian was dead.
And the battle took a while. Blackberry eventually failed due to the lack of apps for the OS. The Blackberry phones were amazingly designed, but the phones didn’t had the apps that the people wanted. And like this, there were only two players remaining in the mobile OS market.
According to androidbettingappguide.co.uk, Android now owns more than 70% of the mobile market worldwide. Android was first started in 2003. It took them two years to be acquired by Google for $50 million. After the process finished, the Android founders joined Google and continued the development of the operating system.
Google marketed Android to their partners and soon the operating system took off. But how is Android taking over the worlds? Why is Android winning versus iOS and other operating systems?
- Android has 2.7 million apps – On the quantity part, Android clearly beat iOS. Quantity sometimes matter less than quality, but the good part is that most of the apps are free, unlike iOS ones.
- A better app store and sideloading – The only option to install an app on a iphone is by getting it out of the app store. On Android, you can actually install an APK file on it. The process is more complicated, but at least you can.
- Better maps – The Android apps are actually the Google Maps – the most accurate map in the world. So here’s clearly that Android win.
- Better battery life – Android actually lets you know how many hours would your phone resist. This is a major plus for them. Another huge plus is the fact that the Android phones always have the fast chargers included in the price.
- Better Customizability – This was always one of the Android’s main advantage. The fact that you can set up your layout however you want.
- Photo backup – One of the best things for Android users – they have unlimited free storage for images under 16 megapixel and videos of 1080p and below. iOS has a similar system, but it’s paid.
And the list can continue if we go a lot into details. Android will probably dominate the market for the future years as well. Their OS is built to run on a huge variety of devices and the smartphones running Android on them are way more affordable than the latest Iphone.
