Most popular Android smartphones in 2017

Looking to better understand which Android smartphones are the most popular around the globe in 2017? We have some exciting statistics based on web traffic data to hundreds of thousands of partner websites using DeviceAtlas for optimization and analytics.

For more up to date figures on the Android landscape, visit our post on the Most Popular Android Smartphones.

Android landscape in 2017

The main point of note in 2017 is that the landscape of Android smartphones has become rather stable across all countries. While today's Android phones vary widely in terms of capabilities and other characteristics, the overall trend is around focusing on those features that are really useful. Some bold attempts to push new features, such as a physical keyboard or a clamshell form factor, are now quite rare. Most phone makers seem to stick to what is market-proven and can guarantee acceptable sales figures.

Among sub-€300 phones released in 2017 we would highlight the Xiaomi Redmi Note 4, Sony Xperia XA1, or Samsung Galaxy A3 (2017). All of these devices come with snappy hardware which is more than enough for day-to-day tasks but perhaps not enough for heavy multitasking, high-quality photos, and power-demanding mobile games.

In terms of the most used screen sizes, the 5-5.1-inch screen size category is now the most used across the globe according to the DeviceAtlas Mobile Report for Q1 2017. It’s an interesting change, given that only a year earlier we reported that 4.7-inch was prevalent in most countries we analyzed.

5.5-inch and 5.7-inch screen sizes were growing pretty fast across the whole of 2016. Interestingly, Samsung Galaxy S8 may soon change the most used screen sizes with its 5.8-inch display. Below you can find a table with 2017’s flagship releases which all fit between 5.1 and 5.8 inches.

Top 5 Android phones based on web traffic statistics

The following tables show the most used Android smartphones based on web traffic in Q1 2017. The data is pulled from DeviceAtlas, a device detection platform used for content optimization and web analytics by some of the largest online players today. For these stats, we used web traffic to hundreds of thousands of partner websites using DeviceAtlas as measured in Q1 2017.

Europe

Samsung's dominance in Europe is clear when you look at the top five phones in the EU5. The Galaxy S family is definitely the most used, especially S5, S6 and S7 depending on the country. Other popular Samsung phones are J5 and A5.

There are only a few exceptions, including the popularity of Nexus phones in France and Huawei phones in Spain.

Africa

In Africa it is apparent that larger phones (5.7-inch) are getting significantly more web traffic than in Europe. This may be related to more mobile-only internet users in Africa who have no constant access to a fixed-line broadband connection.

Asia

There are a few low-cost devices among the top five phones in India, such as Samsung Galaxy J2, and Xiaomi Redmi 3S which were both priced at around €100-€150 at the time of release. In Japan, we noticed that Sony phones were more popular than elsewhere.

South America

In South America, we noticed a slight increase in popularity of the Moto G series, which are among the top five in both Argentina, and Brazil.

North America

The Samsung Galaxy family is definitely the leader in the Android market in both the USA and Canada, occupying the entire list of top five phones in both countries.

Australia

Australia is a yet another country where premium Samsung Galaxy S phones are among the top five most used Android devices according to web browsing statistics in Q1 2017.