iOS vs Android in Black Friday 2013: Apple Cleans Up For Mobile Shopping
Even though Android is leading Apple in market share in the U.S. and around the world, owners of Apple mobile devices used their iPads and iPhones at more than double the rate of Android devices to shop online during Black Friday.
This is just the latest jab in an ongoing mobile OS war between Google and Apple, but for now, Apple is in the lead. According to IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark, which the company says "tracked millions of transactions and terabytes of data from approximately 800 U.S. retail website," iOS devices were the most popular mobile gadgets for shopping on Black Friday.
On average, according to the report, iOS traffic reached 28.2 percent of all online retail traffic on Friday, compared to a measly 11.4 percent for all Android devices; This, despite the fact that Android OS is being run on about 52 percent of the smartphone market, according to a recent comScore report, compared to Apple's 41 percent.
Still, the Black Friday news from IBM is in keeping with general trends of iOS versus Android mobile usage. For example, though Android made by far the highest volume of smartphone shipments in recent months - 81 percent versus about 13 percent of Apple, according to IDC - Apple users tend to be far more active on their iPhones and iPads than a large percentage of people who own Android phones. In fact, according to Forbes, about two thirds of devices running Android are so-called "junk phones." These devices are probably too low powered to deliver a worthwhile shopping experience and/or owned by people who don't even consider shopping with their smartphone.
In contrast, iOS owners tend to be more digitally engaged and wealthier. So the following statistics from IBM will come by no surprise: the average iOS user spent $127.92 per order on Black Friday, while Android users' average was $105.20 the same day. Overall, sales on iOS devices constituted 18.1 percent of all online sales, while, compared to just 3.5 percent Android.
Another metric of online sales, from Adobe (via Business Insider) showed the big picture, and it reflected positively on the iPad as the ultimate shopping gadget:
"iOS-based devices drove more than $543 million dollars in online sales, with iPad taking a 77 percent share. Android-based devices were responsible for $148 million in online sales, a 4.9 percent share of mobile driven online sales....iPads drove the vast majority of online sales with $417 million while iPhones were responsible for $126 million. In comparison, Android-based phones generated $106 million, Android-based tablets $42 million in online sales on Thanksgiving and Black Friday."
Online sales, aided by shopping on mobile devices (even though it's generally still not recommended from a security standpoint), grew by a huge margin this year, furthering the trend away from brick-and-mortar stores and towards digital shopping. Thanksgiving Day sales online grew 19.7 percent, according to IBM, and Black Friday sales increased 19 percent over 2012 as well. Mobile traffic made up almost 40 percent of all online shopping this year - a huge statistic constituted of both online shopping (all the way through to checkout), but also digital perusing and wish list-making.