Jio Phone’s KaiOS Has Beaten Apple’s iOS in India; Android Still #1 But Losing Ground Rapidly!

KaiOS, the humble mobile operating system which powers Jio Phones, has officially beaten the mighty Apple in India.

This is no short of a miracle, as Apple is world’s largest, most powerful tech firm.

Android is still #1, but its market share is declining at a fast pace.

Can KaiOS threaten Android’s dominance in India?

Sorry Apple, KaiOS Has Beaten You!

KaiOS, which has been made by a small US-based company, powering the Jio Phone, is now India’s #2 biggest mobile OS.

As per DeviceAtlas’ latest Mobile Web Intelligence Report, KaiOS now commands 15% share in India. Meanwhile, Apple’s iOS commands just 9.6% share.

This stunning rise in market share of KaiOS has resulted due to a massive decline in Android’s usage.

The report said,

“The new entrant – KaiOS – has already overtaken iOS as the second most used OS in India.”

RIght now, Android commands a 71.6% market share, as it lost 11% to other operating systems, notably KaiOS.

Apple’s share has, in fact, remained constant, but the increase in KaiOS’s market share is indeed very interesting.

KaiOS will be very soon supporting Whatsapp for their users, and once that happens, then their market share is expected to rise further.

But Rural Market Not Warming Up To Jio Phone?

Although KaiOS has witnessed stunning rise, it seems that their target market: Rural India has still not warmed up to the concept of Jio Phone.

As per Telecom Regulatory Authority of India’s latest numbers, Jio has a total of 160.09 million users, out of which 41.08 million users are in rural areas.

This means that Jio’s primary users are still in urban locations, where the usage of Jio Phone wasn’t planned.

With only 25.66% users in rural areas, it is clear that Jio Phone hasn’t become that big in rural India.

Counterpoint Research Associate director Tarun Pathak said,

“Some sales have happened in rural areas as well, but not as compared to urban. Among other factors, this can also be that in the beginning promotions and marketing was more focused on urban India,”

If we compare to other telcos, then Vodafone has the biggest share of rural users: 54% of all Vodafone users in India are in rural India. Idea has 53% share of rural users, while Airtel has 50%.

If we observe IDC India’s associate research director Navkender Singh’s views, then the lack of enthusiasm of Jio Phone in rural areas can be attributed to cost factor.

He said,

“Many in rural areas have not been very enthused about paying Rs 1,500 for three years, when they can talk on a normal feature phone, which is almost half the price of a 4G feature phone..”

How will Jio’s gameplan alter now? We will keep you updated, as we receive more news.