In its Android distribution reports, Google has shown that Gingerbread is slowly losing its grip on the Android market. The keyword here is “slowly” as the most prominent Android OS doesn’t seem to be giving up the fight just yet.
Google released the latest Android distribution report today and there’s some good news – Ice Cream Sandwich distribution has grown yet again. Jelly Bean is also showing signs of life as more users adopt the OS. At the beginning of October, ICS was on 23.7 percent of Android devices. That number has grown to 25.8 percent, a full quarter of the entire Android ecosystem. As for Jelly Bean, it has grown to 2.7 percent from 1.8 percent.
The old dinosaur that is Gingerbread is still hanging on to its majority across Android platforms. At the beginning of the month, Android 2.3 was at 55.5 percent distribution. In a month’s time, that number has only shrunk to 53.9 percent.
It can be frustrating, especially to developers, to see Gingerbread retaining its dominance. It’s not going to change either until more people get newer phones that run ICS. A number of phones running Gingerbread were slated to get upgrades until the handset manufacturer pulled the update. Customers are irritated as they can’t upgrade to a new phone just yet, and it holds back developers who want to focus solely on the improvements afforded by modern operating systems.
There’s still hope for Android 4.0 this year though. A number of people will be receiving new phones over the holidays and the newer phones will come equipped with ICS. It should help boost Android 4.0 distribution. A number of Android handsets will also be getting their ICS upgrades later this month as well. All of this should help to bring down Android 2.3’s distribution below 50 percent.