Over the last year, we’ve seen Android 2.3, or Gingerbread, slowly lose its majority share of Android distribution. Android 4.0, or Ice Cream Sandwich, helped start the decline of Gingerbread, but it was Android 4.1/4.2, or Jelly Bean, that really helped kick Gingerbread to the curb.
In the latest Android distribution numbers released on Monday, Google revealed that Jelly Bean is finally the dominant Android operating system. By combining both Android versions 4.1 (32.3 percent) and 4.2 (5.6 percent), Jelly Bean is now on 37.9 percent of Android devices. Gingerbread is still hanging onto second place, however, with 34.1 percent.
As you can see above, Ice Cream Sandwich, much like Gingerbread, is ceding ground to Jelly Bean as more and more Android users upgrade to devices that use the latest OS. As this trend continues, developers will be able to better target Jelly Bean and ICS devices without having to worry about Gingerbread users.
Next month’s numbers will undoubtedly see the continued rise of Jelly Bean, but it will also hopefully mark the introduction of Android 4.3. The newest version of Jelly Bean is rumored to be coming out this month alongside the rumored new Nexus 7 tablet. Google will upgrade its own Nexus devices to Android 4.3 first, but it shouldn’t take long for carriers to start upgrading some devices to the newest Android version.
