Nielsen: Smartphones dominate US phone purchases

A new report from Nielsen suggests the US is quickly becoming a smartphone nation. As of February 2012, almost half of all mobile subscribers (49.7 percent) own a smartphone. This is up from 36 percent recorded this time last year.

People are buying new smartphones at an amazing clip with more than two-thirds of new buyers choosing a smartphone over a feature phone in the last three months. The breakdown of recent buyers (last three months) by platform shows that Android is the leader with 48 percent of smartphone owners saying they purchased an Android device, while 43 percent of smartphone owners grabbed an iPhone.