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Mobile operating systems and browsers are headed in opposite directionsAs the mobile OS market fragments, mobile browsers are consolidatingDuring a panel at Web 2.0 Expo, someone asked if the panelists saw any signs that suggest mobile operating system fragmentation might decrease. One of the panelists had a blunt answer: "No. There will be more fragmentation." It is striking to see the different trajectories mobile operating systems are on when compared to the mobile web. In 2006, two smartphone operating systems accounted for 81 percent of the market. There were really only four platforms to worry about: Symbian, Windows Mobile, RIM, and Palm OS. These represented 93 percent of the market.
Fast-forward to the present and the picture is different. No single operating system has more than 50 percent marketshare. There are seven operating systems being tracked and even within operating systems there are fragmentation concerns. The future promises more operating system fragmentation, not less:
This list doesn't include differences within each particular operating system. Much has been made of Android fragmentation due to different user experiences like MotoBlur and HTC's Sense UI. And some argue that even the homogenous iPhone platform is starting to fragment. There are more mobile operating systems coming and no signs of the mobile OS market narrowing any time soon. The mobile web is convergingBy contrast, the mobile web is converging on HTML5 and WebKit. Unlike mobile operating systems, mobile browsers were fragmented a few years ago. The list of early mobile browsers include a series of proprietary browser engines:
That's a fraction of the browser options that were available to mobile phone users. And while there is still work to be done to make mobile browsers more consistent, it is nothing compared to the inconsistencies between early mobile browsers. Today, every mobile browser is moving toward HTML5 support, if it isn't there already:
There are a couple of things to keep in mind about this list:
The support isn't perfect, but it is clear that all of the mobile browsers are moving toward supporting full HTML, Javascript and CSS in a way that is already decreasing the difference between browsers. WebKit: The dominant mobile platformThe WebKit browser engine now has a dominant position in mobile browsers. When BlackBerry ships its new browser based on WebKit, 85 percent of smartphones will ship with a WebKit-based browser.
Just because a device uses WebKit does not mean it has the latest version of WebKit and can use HTML5 fully. PPK has documented the many inconsistencies between WebKit implementations. Alex Russell makes a compelling counterpoint that the inconsistencies aren't that bad if you factor in when the browsers shipped. WebKit is also used by numerous feature phones. Vision Mobile estimates that at the end of 2009, WebKit had been embedded in more than 250 million devices. Advancing the mobile browserIn many ways, HTML5 is just the baseline of where mobile browsers are headed. Many companies, from carriers to handset manufacturers, are looking to mobile browser innovation as a key to their mobile strategies.
There are two common threads in each of these stories. First, companies throughout the ecosystem are extending mobile browsers to provide more functionality and attract developers to their platforms. Second, they are all approaching it in similar ways built on HTML widget technology. Much like WebKit, there will be inconsistencies between these efforts in the near term, but all of these efforts are headed in the same direction. Mobile Competitive LandscapeIn December, Morgan Stanley released its Mobile Internet Report. Buried among the more than 1,000 pages in that report was a slide showing probability-weighted scenarios for mobile operating systems:
In the most probable scenario, "products with the best HTML5 browsers gain share." It is no wonder then that so many mobile companies are lining up behind HTML5 and pushing mobile browser technology. Two to many, many to oneIn 2006, two mobile operating systems controlled 81 percent of the market. This year there are 10 different smartphone operating systems. Over that same period of time, mobile browsers have gone from many different proprietary rendering engines to the point where WebKit alone will power browsers in more than 85 percent of the smartphones sold. From two operating systems to many. From many browsers to one. We have two core mobile technologies headed in opposite directions. Related:
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Comments: 5
Jason Grigsby [17 May 2010 08:56 AM]
Quick note: @ppk pointed out that MeeGo's netbook OS will use Webkit by default (Chromium), but it appears that it's smartphone version will use Fenec as the default browser.
It also appears that it will use WebKit for QT and Web Runtime Toolkit (WRT) as part of the MeeGo platform. So it seems likely that it will ship with both Fenec and WebKit, but the default browser will be Fenec.
Or at least that's the best we can tell as of today. :-)
Thadeu [17 May 2010 06:56 PM]
Hi Jason,
Very nice your post. I really appreciated that.
I am looking and thinking about a remote access to a complex system in a complex scenario, where I can have the client getting offline (in fact it might be offline for a considerable time), and I want it working 'as if it had connectivity' (of course with some limitations).
Thnks!
famoot [22 May 2010 03:26 PM]
No it isn't.There is no mobile WebKit!
Even though all those browsers may use something called "WebKit", they are all different, often vastly so.
Jason Grigsby [22 May 2010 03:30 PM]
@famoot
I'm aware of @ppk's post and linked to it in the article. I recommend reading Alex Russell's follow up to PPK which has a good perspective on it.
Regardless, the point of the article isn't to say that everything is an amazing wonderful world of consistency today, but instead a the high-level trends.
No matter how inconsistent WebKit is from platform to platform, it is absolutely more consistent than what is happening at the OS level.
Martin [25 October 2011 06:39 AM]
You pointed out some interesting trends in your post. It does seem like the operating systems are becoming more diverse, while mobile web is converging. That said, I think the two most commonly used operating systems within the near future will be Android and iOS. Also, it may be possible that mobile websites might eventually replace native mobile apps. I mean, it's much easier to develop one HTML5-based application accessible via a mobile browser, as opposed to developing several separate native phone apps (for the iPhone, Android, WindowsPhone, BlackBerry, etc.)
Martin from application development company