Android Fragmentation Split Evenly

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Android’s fragmentation issues are probably the most common complaint regarding Google’s open source Android OS (aside from “it’s not an iPhone”). AndroidCentral has come out with some new numbers regarding how many users are running which version of Android, and the platform is evenly divided.

Here’s AndroidCentral’s numbers:

• Android 1.5 – 37.2%
• Android 2.1 – 32.4%
• Android 1.6 – 29.4%

Pretty even distribution between the three most common versions of Android. This wouldn’t be as much of a problem, except the features and compatibilities for each version of Android vary wildly. Android 2.1 is obviously the best, however, some older Android phones (like the HTC Magic), simply don’t have enough space for the update (although some hackers have gotten modified versions of Android 2.1 on such phones). According to AndroidCentral, Android 2.1 is gaining in market share while Android 1.5 and 1.6 are dropping (as you’d expect).

The worst part is that Android 2.1 adds a lot of functionality, like multi-touch and Google Maps Nav. Like any smartphone OS, the decision to roll out an OS upgrade is up to the carrier (if you want a laugh, look at BlackBerry OS versions – each BlackBerry device on each carrier has its own OS version, it’s a nightmare, thankfully, the versions are fairly similar).

Google said recently that Android 2.2 (Froyo) will be the one version to end all the fragmentation. It’s definitely a good goal (and one that Google should be after), but with the big gap in features between Android 1.x and 2.x, I don’t understand how they’ll be able to merge the two. Best of luck, though.