Worldwide Smartphone Sales to End Users by Operating System in 1Q10 (Thousands of Units)
| Company | 1Q10 Units | 1Q10 Market Share (%) | 1Q09 Units | 1Q09 Market Share (%) |
| Symbian | 24,069.8 | 44.3 | 17,825.3 | 48.8 |
| Research In Motion | 10,552.6 | 19.4 | 7,533.6 | 20.6 |
| iPhone OS | 8,359.7 | 15.4 | 3,848.1 | 10.5 |
| Android | 5,214.7 | 9.6 | 575.3 | 1.6 |
| Microsoft Windows Mobile | 3,706.0 | 6.8 | 3,738.7 | 10.2 |
| Linux | 1,993.9 | 3.7 | 2,540.5 | 7.0 |
| Other OSs | 404.8 | 0.7 | 445.9 | 1.2 |
| Total | 54,301.4 | 100.0 | 36,507.4 | 100.0 |
Source: Gartner via Matt Miller
To give you a handle on how large these numbers are, consider that the Symbian figure equates to around 260,000 smartphones sold PER DAY. A quarter of a million smartphones using Symbian are bought every single day, week in, week out. Like I said, big numbers!
And I'll remake my usual observation that Symbian's figures match that of the other three big players combined. Yes, Nokia and Symbian have something of a tech media image problem in some countries, but the numbers are still extremely healthy.
Particularly interesting is that the big four mobile OS (Symbian, RIM, iPhone and Android) all significantly grew their sales figures, i.e. more new users than ever before, while Windows Mobile, Mobile Linux, Web OS and other contenders are stagnating or falling further behind. At this stage I think we can confidently say that it's going to be a four horse race for the next two years. Although there is some uncertainity is ahead with the advent of Windows Phone 7 and the Samsung Bada.
Steve Litchfield, All About Symbian, 19 May 2010