Nielsen: Android adoption doubled iOS over last three months

BGR reports this morning that Android phones are growing rapidly in market share in the US. That's the word from the Nielsen Company, which just released research conducted in August.

Customer surveys showed that over the last 3 months, ending in August, twice as many people purchased an Android-based phone as bought an iPhone. The percentages are 58% for Android, 28% for Apple. The Apple share has been holding steady in the last few Nielsen surveys.

The Nielsen numbers also show that smartphone sales are growing, as more people upgrade from standard cell phones or feature phones. According to Nielsen's research, 43% of the total population of cellphones are smartphones.

For the 4th quarter, Nielsen sees a resurgence in the iPhone due to new hardware that should be announced any day. "Every time Apple launches a new iPhone or makes it available on a new wireless carrier, there is an increase in their sales," Don Kellogg, Director of Telecom Research & Insights at Nielsen, wrote today on the Nielsen blog.

The numbers also indicate a perilous slide for BlackBerry and 'other' phones which continue to lose marketshare. Not great news for Microsoft Windows Phone 7, but Redmond hopes that the alliance with Nokia will stop the bleeding.

Note: As of this writing, the link to the report on the Nielsen site is broken.