Reception

Android received a lukewarm reaction when it was unveiled in 2007. Although analysts were impressed with the respected technology companies that had partnered with Google to form the Open Handset Alliance, it was unclear whether mobile phone manufacturers would be willing to replace their existing operating systems with Android. The idea of an open source, Linux-based development platform sparked interest, but there were additional worries about Android facing strong competition from established players in the smartphone market, such as Nokia and Microsoft, and rival Linux mobile operating systems that were in development. These established players were skeptical: Nokia was quoted as saying "we don't see this as a threat," and a member of Microsoft's Windows Mobile team stated "I don't understand the impact that they are going to have."

Since then Android has grown to become the most widely used smartphone operating system and "one of the fastest mobile experiences available." Reviewers have highlighted the open source nature of the operating system as one of its defining strengths, allowing companies such as Amazon (Kindle Fire), Barnes & Noble (Nook), Ouya, Baidu, and others to fork the software and release hardware running their own customised version of Android. As a result, it has been described by technology website Ars Technica as "practically the default operating system for launching new hardware" for companies without their own mobile platforms. This openness and flexibility is also present at the level of the end user: Android allows extensive customisation of devices by their owners and apps are freely available from non-Google app stores and third party websites. These have been cited as among the main advantages of Android phones over others.

Despite Android's popularity, including an activation rate three times that of iOS, there have been reports that Google has not been able to leverage their other products and web services successfully to turn Android into the money maker that analysts had expected. The Verge suggested that Google is losing control of Android due to the extensive customization and proliferation of non-Google apps and services - for instance the Amazon Kindle Fire points users to the Amazon app store that competes directly with the Google Play store. Google SVP Andy Rubin, who was replaced as head of the Android division in March 2013, has been blamed for failing to establish a lucrative partnership with cell phone makers. The chief beneficiary of Android has been Samsung, whose Galaxy brand has surpassed that of Android in terms of brand recognition since 2011. Meanwhile other Android manufacturers have struggled since 2011, such as LG, HTC, and Google's own Motorola Mobility (whose partnership with Verizon Wireless to push the "DROID" brand has faded since 2010). Ironically, while Google directly earns nothing from the sale of each Android device, Microsoft and Apple have successfully sued to extract patent royalty payments from Android handset manufacturers.

Tablets The Nexus 7 tablet

Despite its success on smartphones, initially Android tablet adoption was slow. One of the main causes was the chicken or the egg situation where consumers were hesitant to buy an Android tablet due to a lack of high quality tablet apps, but developers were hesitant to spend time and resources developing tablet apps until there was a significant market for them. The content and app "ecosystem" proved more important than hardware specs as the selling point for tablets. Due to the lack of Android tablet-specific apps in 2011, early Android tablets had to make do with existing smartphone apps that were ill-suited to larger screen sizes, whereas the dominance of Apple's iPad was reinforced by the large number of tablet-specific iOS apps.

Despite app support in its infancy, a considerable number of Android tablets (alongside those using other operating systems, such as the HP TouchPad and BlackBerry PlayBook) were rushed out to market in an attempt to capitalize on the success of the iPad. InfoWorld has suggested that some Android manufacturers initially treated their first tablets as a "Frankenphone business", a short-term low-investment opportunity by placing a smartphone-optimized Android OS (before Android 3.0 Honeycomb for tablets was available) on a device while neglecting user interface. This approach, such as with the Dell Streak, failed to gain market traction with consumers as well as damaging the early reputation of Android tablets. Furthermore, several Android tablets such as the Motorola Xoom were priced the same or higher than the iPad, which hurt sales. An exception was the Amazon Kindle Fire, which relied upon lower pricing as well as access to Amazon's ecosystem of apps and content.

This began to change in 2012 with the release of the affordable Nexus 7 and a push by Google for developers to write better tablet apps. Android tablet market share surpassed the iPad's in Q3 2012.

Market share and rate of adoption

Research company Canalys estimated in the second quarter of 2009 that Android had a 2.8% share of worldwide smartphone shipments. By the fourth quarter of 2010 this had grown to 33% of the market, becoming the top-selling smartphone platform. By the third quarter of 2011 Gartner estimated that more than half (52.5%) of the smartphone market belongs to Android. By the third quarter of 2012 Android had a 75% share of the global smartphone market according to the research firm IDC.

In July 2011, Google said that 550,000 new Android devices were being activated every day, up from 400,000 per day in May, and more than 100 million devices had been activated with 4.4% growth per week. In September 2012, 500 million devices had been activated with 1.3 million activations per day.

Android market share varies by location. In July 2012, Android's market share in the United States was 52%, and rose to 90% in China.

Usage share of Android versions Usage share of the different versions collected during a 14-day period ending on March 4, 2013

Usage share of the different versions as of March 4, 2013. Over half of Android devices in Q2 2013 still run a pre 4.x OS version -mostly 2.3 Gingerbread that was released on December 6, 2010, due to many lower-end devices still being released with it. But more than half of Android devices will run Android 4 or 5 as of Q3 2013.

Version Code name Release date API level Distribution (March 4, 2013) 4.2.x Jelly Bean November 13, 2012 17 1.6% 4.1.x Jelly Bean July 9, 2012 16 14.9% 4.0.x Ice Cream Sandwich December 16, 2011 15 28.6% 3.2 Honeycomb July 15, 2011 13 0.9% 3.1 Honeycomb May 10, 2011 12 0.3% 2.3.3–2.3.7 Gingerbread February 9, 2011 10 44% 2.3–2.3.2 Gingerbread December 6, 2010 9 0.2% 2.2 Froyo May 20, 2010 8 7.6% 2.0–2.1 Eclair October 26, 2009 7 1.9% 1.6 Donut September 15, 2009 4 0.2% 1.5 Cupcake April 30, 2009 3 Application piracy

There has been some concern about the ease with which paid Android apps can be pirated. In a May 2012 interview with Eurogamer, the developers of Football Manager stated that the ratio of pirated players vs legitimate players was 9:1 for their game Football Manager Handheld. However, not every developer agreed that piracy rates were an issue; for example, in July 2012 the developers of the game Wind-up Knight said that piracy levels of their game were only 12%, and most of the piracy came from China, where people cannot purchase apps from Google Play.

In 2010, Google released a tool for validating authorised purchases for use within apps, but developers complained that this was insufficient and trivial to crack. Google responded that the tool, especially its initial release, was intended as a sample framework for developers to modify and build upon depending on their needs, not as a finished security solution. In 2012 Google released a feature in Android 4.1 that encrypted paid applications so that they would only work on the device on which they were purchased, but this feature has been temporarily deactivated due to technical issues.