Data Monday: Number of Computing Devices

by July 2, 2012

Three years ago I wrote about the shift from traditional personal computers (PCs) to networked consumer device platforms and tried to make the case for focusing design and development efforts on this next generation of connected products. Today the number of these devices in the market not only sells the story itself and also paints a cloudy picture for businesses dependent on Windows and broadband experiences.

  • 1 billion PCs were powered by Microsoft Windows in June 2012. (source)
  • 450 million Windows 7 (the last major release) licenses were sold through September 2011. At the time 650,000 licenses were being sold per day. (source)
  • 400 million Android devices have been activated through June 2012. Over 1 million Android devices are activated per day. (source)
  • 365 million iOS devices have been sold through March 2012. (source)
  • 600 million people across the World have broadband lines. This is now comparable to the number of active Android and iOS users, who often rely on mobile networks for connectivity. (source
  • 227 million current generation video game consoles have been sold to date. This number consists up of 95.85 Wii consoles, 67.2 million XBox 360 consoles, and 63.9 million Playstation 3 consoles. Video game consoles are increasingly used for Internet and media. (source)
  • 18 million Kinect motion-sensing systems have been sold through January 2012. (source)
  • 26.7 million e-Readers were sold in the last two years. (source).

networked devices

For contrast, compare the numbers above to the ones I highlighted three years ago when explaining why businesses should care about networked consumer device platforms. Back then, we had:

  • 26.4 million iPhone smart phones sold.
  • 18 Android phones due to come to market.
  • 18.6 million iPod Touch media players sold.
  • 22.7 million XBOX 360 consoles sold.
  • And so on...