The graph clearly shows how much "old-fashioned Android terminal" left behind OS version up is running

In May 2017, Google revealed that the number of active Android terminals that are being used on a daily basis exceeded 2 billion units. It is an Android terminal which accounts for about 80% of the smartphone market, but it has a problem of "fragmentation" that the version upgrade rate to the latest OS is low compared to the iOS terminal, and the version of the production terminal becomes complicated It is done. I worked as a technician at Google and MicrosoftDan LuuSays that the older versions of Android OS are on the rise and the fragmentation problem is becoming more serious.

There are over a billion outdated Android devices in use
https://danluu.com/android-updates/

The following data is a graph of the OS version share of the Android terminal based on the information of the device that accessed the Google Play Store in the past 7 days. Since terminals that do not access the Google Play store are not counted, although terminals that access the Google Play Store are generally active terminals that are used on a daily basis, although they can not capture all active terminals, It seems to be said that it is data close to the actual condition of Android users.

There are 103 types in total if you include minor OS version that you can check at the moment. The graph below shows the situation that the version of the production terminal has increased. The horizontal axis is year, the vertical axis isPercentileThe current major version is blue, the current major version is blue, yellow within 6 months is yellow, within 1 year is orange, within 2 years is dark red, within 3 years bright red and white, 4 Bright gray within the year, gray within 5 years, black over 6 years, the OS version 'freshness' is color coded.


"It is confirmed that there is a common tendency that" blue share will increase greatly as new major update comes up and new terminals that adopt new OS will increase and other versions will gradually reduce market share ". However, since the slope of the boundary line between blue and orange becomes gentle as you go through the year, you can see that the proportion of terminals updated by OS is decreasing due to the appearance of the new major version. This is probably due to the fact that Android terminals are getting widespread and the number has increased too much, the room for improvement due to OS revision is small, and the age of use of old terminals is increasing.

On the vertical axis, how much time has elapsed since the appearance of the latest OS of the OS of the terminal is plotted on the horizontal axis, and the transition of each percentile of 50 · 75 · 95 · 99 is graphed like this and it is like this. You can see that the graph drops greatly at the appearance of major OS in the whole sharp rise. While the "rejuvenation" that the old OS will not be used due to the introduction of the new OS is periodically repeated, we can also confirm the fact that the terminal with the old OS continues to be used reliably.


The following graph shows the "outdated" state of OS by age. In 2010 (yellow), 2012 (light green), 2014 (green), 2016 (dark green), the vertical axis shows how long the OS of the terminal has passed since the appearance of the latest OS, the horizontal axis is percentile ) For each age group. As time passes from 2010 to 2016, the graph gathers in the upper right direction, so you can confirm that the outdated OS remains.


If you animate the graph above by age, you can see well that the outdated terminal is surely staying.


Google by fragmentation problem from forcing a difficult task to app developers who have embarked on the resolution, in 2011, but has launched the latest OS support policy "Android Update Alliance", will not be realized was. Also, it is anticipated that OS updates are likely to be easier with the latest Android 8.0 OreoAnnouncementWe are waiting for that realization. Regardless of the OS fragmentation problem compared to iOS, the situation of Android is extremely difficult, and not only the spread of new functions but also follow-up in security is included, Google responds to outdated Android terminals He seems to say that he has not waited.