Google’s Android mobile operating system for smartphones and tablets is now up to 500 million device activations worldwide, and growing at rate of 1.3 million new device activations per day, according to a Google Plus post from Hugo Barra, Google’s director of Android product development.
In comparison, Apple’s iOS mobile operating system, which powers the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, has seen 410 million device activations around the world, according to the most recent publicly disclosed figures from Apple in July.
However, as analysts have noted, Apple devices, specifically the iPhone are considerably less widely available than Google Android devices, in part by design, as Apple is the only company that manufactures Apple devices, compared to the myriad leading companies that make Android devices, from Samsung to LG to HTC to Motorola (owned by Google).
