Android

Android 4.x FTW: Jelly Bean finally the king of the Android ecosystem

posted by Michael H. / Jul 08, 2013, 10:05 PM

Android 4.x FTW: Jelly Bean finally the king of the Android ecosystem

The new monthly Android platform distribution numbers have come out, and it's another big win for our theory that developers might want to drop Android 2.x support all together, because it was another big win for the Android 4.x set, specifically Android 4.1/4.2 Jelly Bean. As expected, Jelly Bean has surpassed Gingerbread (Android 2.3.x) to become the king of the Android ecosystem.

As of last month, Jelly Bean had 33% of the ecosystem compared to Gingerbread's 36.5%, but the roles have reversed with the new July numbers. Jelly Bean has gained almost another 5% of the market and leads all versions of Android at 37.9%, while Gingerbread has dropped to 34.1%. Ice Cream Sandwich is still number 3 on the list, but it has lost share and is down to 23.3%.

The numbers are designed to show developers what users are accessing the Play Store, which are the users that developers would want to target with apps. Android 2.x continues to lose ground to Android 4.x, and that trend won't be reversing any time soon, so we have to ask again: should developers abandon Android 2.x and build for 4.x?

source: Android Developers

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15 Comments

1. rickywinataa

Posts: 262; Member since: Apr 05, 2012

kay, NOW GIVE ME KEY LIME PIE !

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 10:11 PM 10

2. kozza3

Posts: 776; Member since: Oct 17, 2012

calm down! OMG ok I CANT WAIT!!!

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 10:18 PM 2

3. TROLL

Posts: 4851; Member since: Apr 13, 2012

Or 4.3.1 Android Ftw®

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 10:29 PM 1

5. abcdefgh

Posts: 471; Member since: Mar 29, 2013

4.3 has very slight improvements.so as a customer i demand KLP. KLP FTW

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 10:38 PM 4

6. FlushGordon unregistered

Shhh.... HTC owners might not like what you have said.

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 10:43 PM 12

15. apathy88

Posts: 6; Member since: Nov 23, 2012

You do know that the people who have bought HTC phones get some pretty solid dev support. So whether or not HTC releases OS updates quickly or not is beside the point.

posted on Jul 09, 2013, 9:40 AM 0

4. abcdefgh

i bet sammy is atleast 75% of it

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 10:36 PM 9

7. neutralguy

Posts: 1152; Member since: Apr 30, 2012

If htc and lg updated most of their flagship devices from two years ago, JB would be around 40+% I guess.

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 11:25 PM 10

8. TheLolGuy

Posts: 483; Member since: Mar 05, 2013

Have fun when KLP is designed to work on low-end phones and you guys with superphones get nothing.

posted on Jul 08, 2013, 11:58 PM 1

11. abdane

Posts: 507; Member since: Oct 07, 2011

dafuq you talking about ? o.O

posted on Jul 09, 2013, 1:17 AM 3

12. roldefol

Posts: 4744; Member since: Jan 28, 2011

Yeah, backwards compatibility is such a waste. How else is Google going to force us all to buy new phones and keep its best buddy Samsung raking in profits?

posted on Jul 09, 2013, 7:41 AM 0

13. ECPirate37

Posts: 283; Member since: Jul 14, 2011

I believe he is talking about the rumor that Key Lime Pie will be a minimal operating system that will work on even the oldest of Android models. That way all Android models could run it. Then, extra features would be downloadable apps. (i.e. all phones could run KLP, but only the phones capable of running Google Now would be able to download and run that app). As of right now 'tis just a rumor, but it seems plausible.