A new report from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech shows that much of the growth for iOS across Europe in the first quarter of 2015 was fueled by smartphone users ditching Android devices.
The data tracked the EU’s biggest markets in 1Q15— Great Britain, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain— and shows iOS grew 1.8 percentage points from last year to 20.3% market share this year. That includes around 32.4% of new Apple customers switching from an Android device, according to the report, while Android lost 3.1 percentage points during the quarter.
“On average, across Europe’s big five countries during the first quarter, 32.4% of Apple’s new customers switched to iOS from Android,” reported Carolina Milanesi, chief of research at Kantar Worldpanel ComTech.
Apple also enjoyed growth in other markets in the quarter. as Apple grew from 17.9% in Q1 last year to 26.1% this year in China. Kantar notes that “Apple represented 25% of smartphone sales in urban China’s 2,000 to 4,000 RMBs income bracket — a 10.1 percentage point increase from the same period in 2014.”
Android did see minimal growth in the U.S. during the quarter, with a market share of 58.1%, a 0.2 percentage point gain over Q1 2014. LG had a particularly good showing, with its share growing to 10.8% from 7.4% a year ago.
Kantar also noted that the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus already represent 18% of all iPhones in use in the U.S., with 64% of the iPhone installed base using an iPhone 5 or newer. This could be good news for Apple Watch sales, as the new wearable device only works with the iPhone 5 and later.
