NewsTablets

Despite iPad 2 Launch, Analyst Says Android Tablets Will Dominate by 2014

55

In light of the launch of the iPad 2, what little hype recent Android Honeycomb tablets had begun to accumulate has been somewhat squelched. For whatever reason, Apple products have a tendency to do that. Still,  RBC Capital Markets General Manager Mike Abramsky sees Android emerging as the dominant tablet platform by 2014. Though it’s still a few years away, Abramsky believes 40 percent of the projected 185 million tablets sold through the end of 2014 will run on some version of Android.

By that time we will have the iPad 3, and no doubt even the iPad 4 to content with, but the key for Android will be the low-cost tablets coming from OEMs out of Asia. By that time, there is hope that what were once a $200 paperweights running older versions of Android will instead come with some variant of Android Honeycomb (or beyond) designed specifically for the tablet interface. The combination of user experience and low price will be key in winning the tablet war, something current big-name Android tablets have struggled with.

[via IntoMobile]

Kevin Krause
Pretty soon you'll know a lot about Kevin because his biography will actually be filled in!

Motorola XOOM Wi-Fi Headed to Sam’s Club, Priced at $539.99

Previous article

Things We Missed, You Shouldn’t [March 3rd]

Next article

You may also like

55 Comments

  1. LOL “2014”

  2. Ehhh….. Chinese tablets…..? Oh well. A “W” is a “W”.

  3. I am personally curious what these analysts base their information on. Price-wiase, there is little competition as there is with phones. Unless Android tablets get significantly cheaper, I don’t see them taking the lead.

  4. Forced prediction, ari-free!
    Vizio will make android tablets, sell them to everyone in walmart and will be #1 just like they are in TV’s.
    Out of time. Bye bye!

  5. If Android tablets win, it will be because they allow you to be more productive than you can be on an iPad.

    Yes, Steve Jobs is right – you can’t treat a smartphone or tablet as a computer in the traditional sense. It needs to more intuitive and easy to pickup, and that is why the iPhone shattered the very earth.

    However, what’s the point of user friendly design if the only functionality that exists can appease no more than a small minority of consumers? Tablets need to replace laptops not in five years but RIGHT NOW. They need to be made simple like the iPad for basic home media usage but should have the advanced features and customization that Honeycomb possesses for the sake of power users, enthusiasts, developers, and enterprise types. Without attracting the latter crowd, today’s tablets will be nothing more than “expensive toys,” a shared sentiment by all of my iPad-owning family members and friends.

  6. it will happen much earlier than that just like it did with smartphones. . .

  7. yeah I don’t expect things to be any different with tablets. Everyone and his uncle will be making android tablets. Even some company from India that nobody ever heard of before will be making them.

  8. LOL – all the fanboys and girls start chiming in. Regardless of how pathetic your hipster allegiances to Apple products are, the FACTS are the FACTS. In 2008 when Android first came out and there were reports about overtaking the iPhone in 2011, the fanboys scoffed at it. Sure enough, 3 years later – Android has a larger market share and is dominating the handheld market.

    All the evidence points to the same happening with mobile tablets – don’t be mad that technology and competition are catching up to Apple. Eventually it won’t be “the cool thing” to own an Apple device anymore, then you all cool kids can find another way to get campus cred. LOL is right.

  9. Yeah, I doubt it will take until 2014 for Android to dominate the tablet market. That said, Android tablets do have a little ways to go before they really take off though. The cheap ones aren’t good enough and the good ones aren’t cheap enough.

  10. Android driven tablets will have to get significantly cheaper than the current flagship device, Xoom. I feel the sweet spot would be around the $400 to $500 mark. Companies that want to make inroads on the Apple market should act soon, I feel.

  11. “The combination of user experience and low price will be key in winning the tablet war.”

    I couldn’t agree more. I am a die hard android phan and have been since the first whispered rumors of a “google phone.” I’m not so fanatic as to say apple products are crap, but I do recognize that they are not the best. Mostly I hate apple’s business model (Read: lack of options/openness). But yesterday I bought my first ever apple product, an iPad. Why? 349 reasons vs 600 reasons not to buy the Xoom. I mean come on Moto! I have enough left over to buy a nook color and run honeycomb on it. If a die hard android phan like me can buy an iPad based on price, how much more the average joe.

  12. Only apple fanboys keep doubting the power of android. Apple is a rotten fruit doomed to fail. Beta max, mac pcs, iphone, ipad. Initialy superior products who failed to evolve and died. Sure there are differences, but they all illustrate the point the author is making. Look at the past and see the pattern, watch the present-no hdmi, no 4g, no sd card, and copying android features like dual core proccessors, multi-tasking, REAL video chatting, etc. But what will kill apple is its flashgate. Cant do it? Hide it. No no no, flash is dead. The european and asian markets get all the newest phones first because they know what theyre buying and dont buy it. Apple sees this and is playing copycat catchup now. Apple will fail, not just because it is chokeing software inovation like flash, but it cannot update hardware like android without losing consumer confidence because it is tied to both the hardware and software-unlike android. That is the supriority of an open os. Its easy to see that Android will take over when the performance, price, and consumer meet at the nexus that is to come.

  13. But it’s 2011 NOW! Anyway, Apple dominates today and will continue to probably for the remainder of this year, but other OS’s are not standing still, so who’s to say which OS will be on top (there will never be a ‘winner’, only a leader) in 2014.

  14. PM not every tablet will have 1 gig ram like the xoom but even every stinky $200 tablet will have Flash, making ipad2 look pretty useless.
    Coming soon: GPU accelerated 3D in Flash
    http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashplatformruntimes/incubator/features/molehill.html

  15. Smartphone wise can’t be compared to the tablet industry. Android has only beaten Apple in the sense of, there are more Android driven devices. Apple has revolutionised the tablet industry, no one can really disagree since tablets released after have small influences in design (tab). Apple wants everyone to use their products through it’s simple and efficient user interface, whilst google leaves it to the nerds that acutually care about all the ram and graphical jazz. I might be harsh with this comment, but it does reflect the Market. Since Android has made a break in apples Market, more cheaper android devices were born, (wildfire etc.) these products have dominated the Market, these are for people who want a device that can do all sorts of funky stuff, mainly social intergration.

    I don’t understand why Android devices really need tegra and ram, since the device doesn’t even have many “good” games that require such process and detail. Infinity blade, dungeon defenders, and shadow of the obysys are such games that show how powerful the iPhone can reach already, and it doesn’t even have tegra. Why require more power starving hardware?

    Most of the good Android apps are ports from the iOS store, while this gives developers a bigger chance for more revenue, for example doodle jump is a half ass port and facebook didnt even have chat for a long long time. Fragmentation of Android will make it VERY unpopular for the Market as it slowly dies due to the frustration of so many versionings and device specfic apps.

    I do love Androids customisation, but a 1 minute jailbreak can give my iPhone the same freedom, as rooting and downloading newer Roms and installing can really look unattractive for portential customers newer firmware for newer apps. Android has only made iPhone stronger.

  16. Some of the “news” articles you guys post are ridiculous. Step up the standard.

  17. Yup…just like with smartphones…it will be a lil de ja vue.
    .
    Also like with smartphones, the iPad can share a majority of the tablet market with Android. The iPhone 4 sold so many last year so ppl are buying iDevices.
    .
    Its enough pie to go around.

  18. They said Android would be #2 by the end of 2014, and it’s already #1 in 2011. I think Android will dominate late 2011, or early 2012. This first wave of tablets may not be the best, but by the 2nd wave Android manufacturers will finally “get it” on what it takes to succeed and they’ll sell many millions by the end of the year. Cheaper wifi only Android Icecream tablets with the quad core Tegra 3 will rock!

  19. @Lunf
    It’s a given that Apple has a simple user interface. Hell, my mom has one and she is scared to even power on a desktop machine. But, she does notice how different my android phone is compared to my sisters android phone. Yes, she could jailbreak if she wanted to, but how many normal users do that? They should probably start baking that into the os. iOS5 maybe? Given how much they prided themselves on individuality for the desktop market, why wasn’t it a thought on the smartphone.

  20. @Lunf,
    Games will come with the proper processing power. You have a flawed argument here. “There are no games out that utilize tegra 2, etc.” Well, that’s because they lag without the better hardware. Once we get the better hardware hitting mainstream we are sure to see more games rolling out that utilize it. We are already seeing a slew of “iOS only” games hitting the Android market every day.

  21. the smartphone market and tablet markets are different. other companies can not compete on price thereby limiting their chances of moving units in volume. build quality will eventually suffer just to be price competitively. i fear the fruit company will dominate the tablet industry. 3 family members already have an ipad and the others ( my 69 year old mother included!) are looking to buy ipad 2 even after I objected. I told them to wait for the other tablets to be introduced.

  22. i fear we may win the smartphone battle but eventually we will lose the war to that fruit.

  23. I forgot to add that until now, Android didn’t utilize hardware accelerated gui. I do believe that honeycomb (and probably ice cream) do this. This is THE reason why Android phones/tablets haven’t been shipping with more powerful GPUs. Now that we have more than just games utilizing this GPU we are bound to see beefier hardware released. Android is playing catch up, but it will get there.

  24. Wow.

    An analyst talks up Android and its suddenly true.

    As this is an emerging market you have to consider that other players might hold influence.

    Does no one think that RIM/HP and even MS will eat into this market as well, and they may take sales away from Android and not iOS.

    It is possible that some people think that Android 3.0 is a pile of steaming unfinished s**t. Well that’s what I said when I handed back my boss his Xoom today.

  25. @Lunf
    So the i*hone is SO good that it actually helped you get everything you needed to do today done that you had enough time left over to post your nonsense and opinions on an android website?? Good show.

  26. Wow you know what people said about mac os x? Fix the F’n Finder and ‘teh snappy.’ Mac OS X was a very sluggish unresponsive OS. ios is built on mac os x.

  27. I can’t help but wonder if these are the same analysts that pedicted android phones would pass the iphone in sales by 2013, and it happened in 2010.

  28. I think it is too early to say now. Seem no one remembers microsoft, dont forget Windows 8 is coming out with tablet support.

  29. How many are sold is irrelevant. It’s all about the dollars. Profit > units sold.

  30. @Slag,
    What, in your opinion, is so unfinished about it? Just curious. I haven’t sat down and intimately used one, moreso just “played” with one, but I didn’t get anywhere near the vibe of “unfinished pile of crap”. It does, like the iPad, feel like an expensive toy though to me. Doesn’t really do anything that I can;t do BETTER on other devices, namely my netbook which is less than half the cost for the same specs.

  31. The tablet is a toy but if android is well developed on that platform, it can move up to the next step which is android on netbooks. Because in the end, Android is really about challenging Microsoft, not Apple.

  32. RBC-CM’s GM is right, and he said by 2014; not in 2014. Smartphones with Android caught up faster than expected and with the computer industry now fully attacking the tablet area it’s simply a question of when Android surpasses the iPad, not if.

  33. @Bela
    Hmm fair point but would Developers are still shy of stepping out of the apples own app store, a lot of developers world wide, can already trust that submitting their application to iOS first could give it enough spot light to be worth it porting to other devices. If the iPhone can’t support the higher quality games. Not that there aren’t any Android developers, but the quality of the apps aren’t as par to the app store. There are a few exceptions, but wither of not developers are keen to utilise this new power is uncertainty. But the power is there, I guess motivation (new android developers challenge for example, since it’s been a while) would give a good start for developers to develop specifically for Android.

    @clamech
    I was comparing the jailbreak process to the rooting process. Normal users would want to use apps that might requre 2.3 for example, and if their device doesn’t have 2.3 they must root to flag a rom correct? Why should this be needed (not in the sense of added features but third party should make a better why to distribute newer firmware and/or google makes it more version friendly). Say your sister wants an app called Sims 3 (example) that requires 2.3, her device can only get 2.1, she has to root flash etc. To be able to get the game. This isn’t very consumer friendly. Applications may not have restrictions now (not as much) but when more and more versions of android hit, you’ll see a bigger gap in versioning and device specific apps that’ll fragment the Market.

    @2legit
    I’m actually interesting in Android devices, I actually do have one. But I’m just seeing slight problems that make me favour the iPhone more. I’m still waiting for the day where it’ll actually change me back, I do love the android platform but I believe there are flaws. It only made iPhone better because some of the ways android worked was ported other to iOS which really made it better, (that’s a compliment) and I guess maybe Android can step up truly and actually revolutionise rather then make as much phones possible and further clog up the Market.

  34. @Bela

    I was reading back, and I missed a huge point. A reason why developers would develop for the iOS, is because most of the smartphone games etc. Was brought out on the app store. Hence, developers would release their app there first, to see if there’s Market for that application. Further down the road, they can expand to other devices. Example would be, Angry Birds, Doodle Jump and Dungeon Defenders. Two of these apps are known mostly world wide, some other quality games that iOS has is Cut The Rope, Infinity Blade, Tiny Wings etc. Popcap has also supported the app store for so long, that’s it’s still only being ported.

    Having better hardware is good, but does the battery really say it’s worth it, in the end. I don’t know how long the battery lasts with a tegra 2 game, but the even Android (without tegra 2) battery life is subpar to an iOS device.

  35. Also reading some above posts, apple doesn’t need a SD card slot, because they have been famous for their storage devices that are built in the device. (iPod) they still deliver. 16/32/64 Flavours of the iPad, I’d doubt you’d used that much. Secondly, someone stated that all the new phones come out in Asia and Europe, for Android, probably true, but you also mentioned no 4g? I don’t think there’s even one country in Europe with 4G and I think only japan has 4G in Asia. Apple knows that, and hasn’t bothered with 4g since it’s not just going flip a massive switch and enable 4g in flagship countries (Uk, Paris, Japan) etc. Also FaceTime is real video chatting, and hdmi out is available for iPad 2,

    As a web designer flash is sh!t, but I can throw on to the table that the android browsers (dolphin, default.. Etc) don’t support HTML 5 and CSS 3 which is the true future of the web. Flash is rarely uses for games etc on android but to play videos, and as safari on iPhone has html 5 render, you can have native video playback from within the browser, just like flash without all the stability bull. Because all it does is render, not client needed to be installed, and high quality (YouTube HTML iPhone site). Flash is just trouble.

  36. @lunf dungeon defenders was developed for both android and ios at the same time, as well as several other platforms. It might have been released on ios first, but that doesn’t mean the android version was a port.

    Also, you say honeycomb feels unfinished, well I got news for you from software development 101, software is almost never “finished” nowadays. The only reason the ios feels finished is because there are so few things it can do. Android is more like real software, they have so many things in it there are bound to be some hiccups.

    I (and many other people,) would rather have more functionality that is less than perfect.

  37. Korea was the first country in the world to get 4g. Korea is ahead of the entire human race.

  38. But since were going to die in 2012 it doesn’t matter….

  39. Main reasons why I never got into the apple craze…

    1: When it first came out i was into the crappy windows mobile scene, and as a poor mp3 player windows made, I also bought an mp3 separately. Mp3′ are simple designs. You have a file you can add music folders into and then play it. However, Apple likes to force you to use Itunes to transfer music, which took a lot longer and makes me watch a bunch of advertisements I don’t want to see. maybe I didn’t take the time to search out other methods to transfer files, and maybe there are others, but that was a total turn off, and now I rather not bother.

    2: On Average, the amount you will spend on Apple products after you bought the item, is going to be 3 times higher than you would normally pay for any other items in the same price range. Android overall is going to be the cheapest product out-of-box… It also has a very awesome user interface that I think looks better, and is every bit as much as stable as apples i have tested. Perhaps more stable. As long as you don’t run too much crap on a decent Android product, you will almost never crash, and if your item does crash, it recovers very well.

    My prayer is to see Android hit the computer market with something to make Microsoft Windows 7 ($270 at best buy) look like a piece of dirt with a price tag for under $75

  40. WHY IS PHANDROID.COM CENSORING AND REMOVING COMMENTS. FUCK THIS

  41. Not likely unless Google do something about power consumption of the radios in all devices. I’ve used a bunch of Android devices over the last 2 years and they all suffer the same problem. No use have a portable device if you can’t use the Internet or wifi without fear of emptying the battery.

    It will be interesting to see what happens in 2 years when all the eclair/froyo phones come off contract.

  42. has anyone noticed how much more apple fanboy and girls have been showing up on this forum? Just putting it out there.

  43. @josh White said

    “I (and many other people,) would rather have more functionality that is less than perfect.”

    That is why people pay for IOS apps, because they work and peopleare not willing to pay for buggy software.

    Android has to offer the functionality for free because you accept that its less than perfect, great for you, shite for a developer that wants to make a living.

    @hyouroh said

    “has anyone noticed how much more apple fanboy and girls have been showing up on this forum? Just putting it out there.”

    If this a closed forum where you need to sign allegiance to Google and not point out that other systems might be both as good or better, then point me to the door.

    Plenty of other forums see a haze of angry anti apple guys buzz in when any review or editorial of Apple kit is put up on other sites.

    It should be taken as a sign that Google are doing something right as people feel inclined to come and face the wrath.

  44. Why are people so afraid of competition?

  45. not sure how android tablets will do, but android phones alone will outsell ipod touch + iphone + ipad combined, and the android tablets will just be the icing on the cake for android.

  46. Some people like apple. Personally, I don’t care for the apple communism model.

  47. @ Josh White – “Android is more like real software, they have so many things in it there are bound to be some hiccups.” That’s why a $349 iPad 1 will be my first ever Tablet. My Bionix Vibrant simply works just like the iPad simply works. My hands on with the XOOM left me feeling like an Android tablet has too much going on and it was choppy. I expected superior performance than the iPad sitting close by but instead I’m left feeling like my phone performs better. I’ll buy a $349 iPad NOW and hopefully after i’m bored with it there will be quad core Android tablets and Honeycomb will be “finished”.

  48. Am I the only one that thinks the ipad seems just like an iphone with a biggerr screen but the xoom actually feels different with honeycomb – like a whole new experience/type of device?

  49. Analysts….are those the guys who take it from behind all the time?

  50. @Mark I probably doubt that, I know a majority of users have an Android phone, and a iPod Touch, because Android doesn’t deliver the quality of apps. However, I did state ‘probably’ because there are a lot of Android devices vs the 10 or so iOS devices that people can purchase. 10 (or so devices) vs 100 android devices out in the market (or more), it’s a no brainer Android would’ve caught up to the iOS race. All because it sells more doesn’t mean it’s better. It’s not quantity, but quality. There are only a few android devices, that really shine out of all the others, and these devices don’t particularly sell that well (in the sense of how iPhone sales).

  51. I’m an Android fan but I have my doubts about Android in the tablet space.

    Not that I buy all of Steve Jobs’ codswallop but he’s right about the ‘experience’ mattering. And on this front, content is king.

    Honeycomb is the better OS for sure. The browser is awesome. Widgets, homescreens, etc. are just soo much better. However….I already have a smartphone (Nexus One) that does a lot of that. So what do I need from my tablet? APPLICATIONS. Where are they on Android? Look at Apple’s own apps on the iPad: Pages, Numbers, Keynote, Garageband, Photobooth, iMovie, etc. Where’s the equivalents on Android?

    Unless Google can really get app development going on Android (And I am not talking about quantity. I am talking quality.), they are going to have a tough time making headway against Apple in this space.

    To start with, how about an awesome tablet specific native app for Google Docs in Honeycomb?

  52. @Keith

    Those are the same type of arguments that were made against Android when it was just a blip on the radar. Do you really believe, after seeing all that has happened, that somehow, quality apps for Honeycomb aren’t going to materialize? If you do, you’re in for rude awakening. They say 2014, I say by end of next year if that far Android is going to rule the tablet space as well.

  53. ^Exactly…
    .
    Some folks said the same thing about Android phones back in 2008, 2009…
    .
    Look what happened with that.

  54. Once again Apple = FAIL

  55. apple is far supperior droid is cheaper crap I laugh at droid its plain garbage its just that simple!!! lol

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

More in News