Kindle Fire Accounts for 37% of U.S. Android Tablet Market

News
By Zak Islam
published

Barnes and Noble Nook took second place with a 10 percent share.

Mobile marketing and apps analytics firm Localytics has revealed that Amazon's Kindle Fire accounts for 37 percent of the U.S. Android tablet market.

The U.S. is the dominant market for Android tablet sales with a 59 percent share of global sales. Localytics says Amazon's share of the U.S. market has grown to the point where tablet app developers should make sure their apps are available through Amazon's App Store (the Google Play Store is not available on the Kindle Fire).

"In the meantime, any Android developer with a focus on tablets should be distributing their apps in the Amazon App Store," said Localytics, which analyzed data from over 500 million unique devices during its research.

"The degree to which Amazon has dominated their most serious geographical market should speak to the future potential, and since Google Play is unavailable on the Kindle Fire family, adding Amazon’s App Store as a distribution channel is important."

The Barnes and Noble Nook tablet took second place with a 10 percent market share in the U.S., while Samsung Galaxy devices settled for a 9 percent share. The Google Nexus 7, meanwhile, follows behind in fourth with an 8 percent market share.

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Zak Islam
16 Comments Comment from the forums
  • bustapr
    i honestly expected the nexus 7 to have alot more than just 8% considering all the praise and sort of religious following its garnered. I do like that the Nook tablet isnt getting too overshadowed by the rest of the market, it really is a great option at its price range.
    Reply
  • ubercake
    Amazon is good to its customers. This is key.
    Reply
  • tokencode
    It's because you get a lot for your money with the kindle when it comes to hardware, mainly because Amazon subsidizes it in order to have another pair of eyes to sell content to.
    Reply
  • chuckydb
    No access to google play is the reason I hate this tablet. Nexus 7 all the way!!!!
    Reply
  • john15v16
    Yeah...nexus 7 is the new hotness...awesome tablet...
    Reply
  • ddpruitt
    I'm a little concerned regarding these numbers. I don't think they're accurate. Reason I say so is that the majority of the time these stats come out they have no problem giving the process with which they came up with the numbers. In this case they provide the numbers but don't give the method, that concerns me.
    Reply
  • whiteodian
    chuckydbNo access to google play is the reason I hate this tablet. Nexus 7 all the way!!!!I would agree that Nexus 7 is the way to go, but the Kindle Fire had a year jump on it so it's got higher numbers. On top of that Amazon has done a great job at pushing it and making it a success. As far as the Google Play apps, you can get those on the kindle without rooting. I recently copied a game from my Nexus 4 to dropbox and then to the Kindle. The game runs well on the Kindle as well. It was pretty easy, but would be nice if they allowed the Play store on Kindles.
    Reply
  • Non-Euclidean
    I think a bunch of these were driven by this past holiday season's price.
    Reply
  • Non-Euclidean
    OTOH, its clearly at the bottom pricewise, but above the no-name crap out there.
    Reply
  • beardguy
    I own a Kindle Fire HD and love it. Access to the Google Play store does not mean much imho. The market is way to fragmented in terms of hardware, and so you are just not going to see games/apps specifically made for the Nexus 7. So having access to the Google play store, does not mean you will be getting great tablet apps/games or even that they will work well on your Nexus 7.

    With the Kindle Fire, at least you know the apps/games you see in the Amazon market place are compatible with your device and will run and work well. On top of that, there is more quality control in the Amazon Market and so even if your choices are fewer, the quality is higher overall.

    Besides, there are so many shit apps out there, I really don't see the appeal to have to filter through more to find anything good.
    Reply