Android vs iPhone: Five Things Comparison

In this year's smart phone market, Apple's iPhone and Google Android phones will put on a fierce war with the release of their new products. Here we comparise Android and iPhone through five things. Well, now we take a look at what aspects will them compete in, by the way predicted who is more advanced in these areas.

1. Equipment

The new iPhone 4 has a very impressive configuration, which includes a front camera with 720p HD video recording function, 5-megapixel rear camera, longer battery life and a 3.5-inch display with 960x640 resolution.

On the other hand, the latest Android phone released in June is the most anticipated Motorola Droid X. By the way, Motorola Droid X were sold out on the starting day. It comes with a 4.3-inch screen, HDMI output and 720p video recording capability. This new Droid phone's screen resolution reaches up to 854x480, and has a 8-megapixel camera with a flash. In addition, it is said that Droid X is likely to run Android 2.1 operating system, but it is uncertain whether it will support Adobe's Flash Player 10.1 version.

Both iPhone 4 and Droid X's performance indicators are very good. Compared with the iPhone 4, the only defect of Droid X is it doesn't have front camera. But seen from the other hand, Android phone HTC EVO 4G have this configuration. Although Apple usually upgrade the hardware of its smart phones every year, but a new Android phone can appears in the market only in a few months. After all, the Android handset manufacturers are many, and each new released Android phone is better than the previous mode, but Apple is not able to keep the same update pace with many company.

Winner: Android

2. Sales and marketing

An Morgan Stanley analyst had expected: iPhone users volume worldwide is expected to reach 100 million by the end of 2011. For today's 30 million iPhone users, this will be a very big jump. According to Nielsen's latest survey data show: In the U.S., Apple accounts for 28% of smartphone market share, Android phone only accounts for 9%. But both of their sales increased 2% in the first quarter of this year.

Previously, a NPD survey report said that Android phone's sales volume has exceed iPhone in the first quarter. At the same time, Gartner said Android phone's sales increased by 707% in the first quarter.

Although Android phone's momentum is fierce and has a wide variety, the iPhone still accounts for a greater proportion in the smartphone market. If Google wants Android mobile phone to defeat the iPhone, it must keep Android phone sales growing for a long time. But with Android phone's frequent upgrades, Android phones are difficult to maintain the momentum. Meanwhile, although Google succeed with Android mobile phone, but it still can not copy the upsurge when new Apple mobile phone iPhone releases. In fact, six days before the release of Apple iPhone 4, there have some braves start camping in Dallas.

Winner: iPhone

3. Mobile operator partners

In the United States, AT&T is iPhone's exclusive carrier, this situation has existed since 2007. If you want to get iPhone, you must seek refuge with AT&T. However, rumors said, Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint and other U.S. mobile operators may also sell iPhone, to end AT&T's exclusive carrier status of iPhone in the U.S. history.

As the Android mobile phone are from different manufacturers, the number of mobile operators of Android phones far exceeds iPhone. In this case, Apple may consider cancel the marketing strategy that only cooperating with one mobile operator in a specific market as soon as possible.

Winner: Android

4. Operating system

Apple usually has only one operating system on the market to sell, recently it makes updated iOS able to use on all of its old equipments. By contrast, Android's versions for different hardware are confused, such as Android 1.6 , 2.1, and the upcoming 2.2 version. This situation will make consumers not know what to do in a certain extent, because they have to figure out which system their Android mobile phone use, and worry that the choosing older versions of Android system will lack some of the latest features. Relatively speaking, iPhone OS version is easily recognized, and at present, there are only two versions --- iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS. Moreover, the functional differences between the operating system are not great.

Winner: iPhone

5. Applications

In some ways, the battle between the smart phone operating systems, the largest battlefield should be applications. Only after that the number of applications increases, and the performance can meet user's demand, the corresponding amount of smart phone users can achieve large-scale development. Because of this, Apple and Google have attached great importance to the application's development.

Now the available number of Apple iPhone's applications has been over 20 million, Google's Android application amount is also up to 30,000. Either iPhone or Android's applications has been able to meet the daily needs of most consumers.

But Apple announced shortly before, cross-platform application development tool was banned to use, which called for external developers to develop applications only for iPhone. In contrast, Google is willing to strengthen Android platform's openness, and is willing to cooperate with Adobe for Flash technology support. For now, Apple and Google are working at increasing the total number of applications on their own application store.

Winner: none

Related article: Google Android vs Apple iOS for Global Market