Android Tablets Outsold iPads For The First Time Last Year

Android tablet sales to end users surged past iPad sales during 2013, according to new Gartner data compiled by BI Intelligence.

For the year, tablet sales to end users grew 68% for 2013. That's roughly in line with BI Intelligence's estimate for 2013 tablet shipments growth, which we pegged at about 75% for the year (not all shipments will be sold through to consumers).

Here are the key trends:

• Android tablets had a massive 2013. About 121 million Android tablets were sold to consumers in 2013, up 127% from the 53 million sold during 2012. Android accounted for 62% of tablet sales in the year, up from 46% last year.
• About 70 million iPads were sold during the year, which is only up 15% over the 61 million sold during 2012. Apple's majority 53% market share of sales in 2012 has dwindled to just 36% in 2013.
• This is the first year more people bought Android tablets than iPads. Gartner says much of the overall tablet market growth was fueled by low-cost, smaller-screen devices and first-time tablet buyers.
• Microsoft tablets exhibited the highest growth. About 4 million Microsoft tablets were sold during 2013, which is up 247% from the 1.1 million sold in 2012. Its market share doubled, but only from a minimal 1% to 2%.

Check out BI Intelligence's charts at the bottom of this post for a look at how the tablet market is shaping up.

The most interesting trends are happening on the high and low ends of the market.

On the high end, mature markets are reaching saturation, with sales growing only 31% on the year.

It's a big reason why Apple's market share of sales dipped over 16 percentage points in 2013.

On the low end, ultra low-cost generic or "white-box" tablet vendors are reaping the lion's share of the benefits of the growing tablet market in emerging markets. White-box tablets helped push tablet sales up 135% for the year in emerging markets and have propelled Android to a dominant 62% share of the market.

It should be noted that Gartner lumps white-box and forked Android tablets, like the Amazon Kindle Fire, into the Android category. But, Amazon Kindle Fire sales were only up 22% year-over-year, meaning they were not as instrumental as other non-brand, white-box tablets in pushing Android's enormous 127% growth.

BI Intelligence provides in-depth charts, reports, forecasts, and analysis on the mobile market, which can be easily downloaded and put to use. For full access to BI Intelligence's data, sign up for a free trial.