In a considerable win for Apple, the company’s latest operating system, iOS 7 has reached the 74% mark, the Cupertino company reported, with iOS 6 sitting at 22% and previous OS’s accounting for the meagre remaining 4%.

Apart from indicating that iDevice users have in fact taken to the iOS 7 redesign, which was quite drastic as compared with the hop from iOS 5 to iOS 6, there is another reason why this adoption rate is important. It heralds good news for iOS app developers, and thus app users. The high adoption rate of iOS 7 enables app developers to develop for a single, or at most two versions of the users, while being confident that they will target the majority of users.

Also though, it creates a compelling reason for general iDevice users who haven’t yet upgraded, as more than likely we will start seeing an increasing number of apps being developed that require iOS 7.

Sweet treats and fragmentation threats   

Apple’s position is a far cry from the still fragmented nature of Android. Indeed, Google’s situation is a lot less rosy, with a mere 1% of its users opting to ‘have a break’ with Android Kitkat (4.4). This while 37% of Android users are still sitting on Android JellyBean (4.1), more tellingly, 24% of users are apparently sticking with the now aging Android Gingerbread (2.3) and only 18% have cooled their Android smartphone’s palette with an Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0).  

To our minds though, Google really should put considerable effort into distinguishing its different Android versions, and thus encourage more people to consolidate to the latest version. Complicating matters is that manufacturers have their own update schedules. 

Nonetheless, from an app perspective, with the cooperation of all parties, consolidation would go a long way to helping Google  entice more developers to create apps for the Android platform, as Apple has so successfully done.