Google released its Android usage share numbers today, which typically arrive monthly, with the exception of last month. Because of that, this is the first time that Android 7.0 Nougat has appeared on the board.
The data was collected throughout a seven-day period ending today, November 7. Android 5.1 Lollipop is still showing growth, for some reason, but Marshmallow is the big winner this month, as it's now installed on almost a quarter of all Google Play devices, now a full 13 months after its release.
| Version | Codename | API | September | This month | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2.2 | Froyo | 8 | 0.1% | 0.1% | - |
| 2.3.3 - 2.3.7 | Gingerbread | 10 | 1.5% | 1.3% | -0.2 |
| 4.0.3 - 4.0.4 | Ice Cream Sandwich | 15 | 1.4% | 1.3% | -0.1 |
| 4.1.x | Jelly Bean | 16 | 5.6% | 4.9% | -0.7 |
| 4.2.x | 17 | 7.7% | 6.8% | -0.9 | |
| 4.3 | 18 | 2.3% | 2.0% | -0.3 | |
| 4.4 | KitKat | 19 | 27.7% | 25.2% | -2.5 |
| 5.0 | Lollipop | 21 | 13.1% | 11.3% | -1.8 |
| 5.1 | 22 | 21.9% | 22.8% | 0.9 | |
| 6.0 | Marshmallow | 23 | 18.7% | 24.0% | 5.3 |
| 7.0 | Nougat | 24 | - | 0.3% | 0.3 |
While Marshmallow has a long way to go before catching up to the most-used codename, Lollipop, Android 6.0 is coming very close to the most-used single version, which is 4.4. KitKat has been steadily declining, showing a 2.5% drop over the last two months and 1.5% in the month before that. It seems likely that Marshmallow will take its place next month.
As for the rest of the board, Lollipop showed an overall loss, as it has been doing every month since May. For some reason, version 5.1 continues to grow though. Jelly Bean also showed significant drops in usage, with a total loss of 1.9%.
Older versions of Google's mobile OS have seen minimal change as usual, with small drops in Gingerbread and Ice Cream Sandwich (0.2 and 0.1, respectively). Froyo still continues to cling to life at 0.1%, as it has for some time now.
Finally, Android 7.0 made its first appearance with 0.3%. Despite being two and a half months old already, the news shouldn't be surprising, as it's only available on Nexus devices and LG's new V20.
Remember, this month's changes are for a two-month period, as Google didn't release any usage information for the month of October.
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