Android continues to surge, report shows

Android continues to gobble up more smartphone customers, according to the new stats from market researcher ComScore.

Looking at the three months ending August, Android's market share rose to 19.6 percent in the U.S.--a gain of 6.6 points from the prior three months. Though Google's smartphone platform is still third among the top five, it was the only one to show growth in market share for the period.

Among the other major players, RIM was the leading smartphone platform with 37.6 percent of U.S. subscribers. Apple was next in line with 24.2 percent. Microsoft accounted for 10.8 percent, and Palm came in last with 4.6 percent. These four companies shedded market share to Android during the quarter, but ComScore noted in its press release yesterday that most smartphone platforms still won more subscribers outright over the summer due to ever-increasing consumer demand.

The 55.7 million people in the U.S. who owned smartphones during the three months ending August represented a jump of 14 percent over the prior three months.

Analyzing the overall mobile phone market, Samsung was the top handset manufacturer for the three months with 23.6 percent of U.S. subscribers, ComScore noted. LG was in second place with a 21.2 percent share, followed by Motorola with 18.8 percent, RIM with 9 percent, and Nokia with 7.6 percent. Among the top five handset makers, only Samsung and RIM took home gains in market share.

Over the same period, 67 percent of the mobile users texted on their devices, 34.5 percent used mobile browsers, 32 percent downloaded apps, 23 percent played games, 22.5 percent visited social networks and blogs, and 15 percent listened to music. All six activities rose in popularity among subscribers compared with the prior three months.