Mobile operating system - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A mobile operating system, also known as a mobile OS, mobile software platform or a handheld operating system, is the operating system

Operating system

An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...

that controls a mobile device or information appliance

Information appliance

In general terms, an information appliance or information device is any machine or device that is usable for the purposes of computing, telecommunicating, reproducing, and presenting encoded information in myriad forms and applications....

—similar in principle to an operating system such as Windows

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows is a series of operating systems produced by Microsoft.Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985 as an add-on to MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces . Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal...

, Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

, or Linux distributions that controls a desktop computer

Desktop computer

A desktop computer is a personal computer in a form intended for regular use at a single location, as opposed to a mobile laptop or portable computer. Early desktop computers are designed to lay flat on the desk, while modern towers stand upright...

or laptop

Laptop

A laptop, also called a notebook, is a personal computer for mobile use. A laptop integrates most of the typical components of a desktop computer, including a display, a keyboard, a pointing device and speakers into a single unit...

. However, they are currently somewhat simpler, and deal more with the wireless versions of broadband and local connectivity, mobile multimedia formats, and different input methods.

Typical examples of devices running a mobile operating system are smartphone

Smartphone

A smartphone is a high-end mobile phone built on a mobile computing platform, with more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary feature phone. The first smartphones were devices that mainly combined the functions of a personal digital assistant and a mobile phone or camera...

s, personal digital assistant

Personal digital assistant

A personal digital assistant , also known as a palmtop computer, or personal data assistant, is a mobile device that functions as a personal information manager. Current PDAs often have the ability to connect to the Internet...

s (PDA

PDA

A PDA is most commonly a Personal digital assistant, also known as a Personal data assistant, a mobile electronic device.PDA may also refer to:In science, medicine and technology:...

s), tablet computer

Tablet computer

A tablet computer, or simply tablet, is a complete mobile computer, larger than a mobile phone or personal digital assistant, integrated into a flat touch screen and primarily operated by touching the screen...

s and information appliance

Information appliance

s, or what are sometimes referred to as smart devices, which may also include embedded system

Embedded system

An embedded system is a computer system designed for specific control functions within a larger system. often with real-time computing constraints. It is embedded as part of a complete device often including hardware and mechanical parts. By contrast, a general-purpose computer, such as a personal...

s, or other mobile devices and wireless devices.

History

The increasing importance of mobile devices has triggered intense competition amongst software giants such as Google

Google

Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...

, Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

, and Apple, as well as mobile industry leaders Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

, Research In Motion

Research In Motion

Research In Motion Limited or RIM is a Canadian multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada that designs, manufactures and markets wireless solutions for the worldwide mobile communications market...

(RIM), and Palm

Palm, Inc.

Palm, Inc., was a smartphone manufacturer headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, that was responsible for products such as the Pre and Pixi as well as the Treo and Centro smartphones. Previous product lines include the PalmPilot, Palm III, Palm V, Palm VII, Zire and Tungsten. While their older...

, in a bid to capture the largest market share pre-emptively.

With the release of the iPhone

IPhone

The iPhone is a line of Internet and multimedia-enabled smartphones marketed by Apple Inc. The first iPhone was unveiled by Steve Jobs, then CEO of Apple, on January 9, 2007, and released on June 29, 2007...

in 2007, Apple significantly disrupted the mobile industry and effectively ushered in a new era of mobile operating systems for smartphones and other devices that focus on user experience and rely on finger-operated touch-based interaction. In November 2007, Google formed the Open Handset Alliance

Open Handset Alliance

The Open Handset Alliance is a consortium of 84 firms to develop open standards for mobile devices. Member firms include Google, HTC, Sony, Dell, Intel, Motorola, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, T-Mobile, Nvidia, and Wind River Systems.-History:The OHA was...

with 79 other hardware, software, and telecom companies to make inroads into the smartphone market through its new Android operating system. Though its reception was mainly positive from the media and public, the release of Android created a rift between Apple and Google, eventually leading to the resignation of Google's ex-CEO, Eric Schmidt, from Apple's board of directors.

Since the launch of both Apple's iOS and Google's Android, the smartphone market has exploded in popularity and in May 2010 accounted for more than 17.3% of all mobile phones sold. This has led to greater consumer awareness of the various mobile operating systems, with telecoms and manufacturers regularly advertising the advantages of their OS. As of January 2011, Google holds 33.3% of the smartphone market worldwide, demonstrating amazing growth for Android which held only 4.7% a year earlier. Nokia, Apple, RIM, and Microsoft hold 31%, 16.2%, 14.6%, and 3.1% respectively.

Market projection

Mobile platforms are in the nascent stage and any projection regarding market growth is hard to make at the present time. However, a clear trend is the surging growth of mobile operating systems which are developed for smart devices, rather than for feature phones. As of February 2011, Nokia has announced a partnership with Microsoft which effectively ends the development of Symbian OS, the most popular feature phone OS, by the end of 2011 in favor of Windows Phone

Windows Phone 7

Windows Phone is a mobile operating system developed by Microsoft, and is the successor to its Windows Mobile platform, although incompatible with it. Unlike its predecessor, it is primarily aimed at the consumer market rather than the enterprise market...

.

It is noteworthy that Intel is taking the initiative to focus on portable devices other than mobile phones. They are Mobile Internet Devices (MID) and Ultra-Mobile PC

Ultra-Mobile PC

An ultra-mobile PC is a small form factor version of a pen computer, a class of laptop whose specifications were launched by Microsoft and Intel in spring 2006. Sony had already made a first attempt in this direction in 2004 with its Vaio U series, which was however only sold in Asia...

(UMPC). Meantime, Palm abandoned its plan to develop Foleo

Palm Foleo

The Palm Foleo was a planned subnotebook computer that was announced by mobile device manufacturer Palm Inc. on May 30, 2007, and canceled three months later. It intended to serve as a companion for smartphones including Palm's own Treo line...

, which was to be a companion device for a smartphone.

Mobile navigation

Canalys

Canalys is an independent technology focused analyst house. It offers its clients market intelligence, analysis and strategic consultancy about trends and activity in a range of high-tech markets, and with route-to-market strategies...

has estimated that in 2009 the installed base of smartphones with integrated GPS was 163 million units worldwide, of which Nokia accounted for more than half (51%), having shipped cumulatively 83 million GPS devices. On January 22, 2010, Nokia released a free version of Ovi Maps in an effort to increase its number of users.

Popular operating systems

Operating system

s that can be found on smartphones, mobile OS-powered tablet computer

Tablet computer

s, and other mobile devices include Google

Google

's Android, Apple's iOS, RIM's

Research In Motion

BlackBerry OS

BlackBerry OS is a proprietary mobile operating system, developed by Research In Motion for its BlackBerry line of smartphone handheld devices...

, Microsoft

Microsoft

's Windows Phone

Windows Phone 7

, Linux

Linux

Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...

, HP's webOS, Samsung

Samsung

The Samsung Group is a South Korean multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea...

's Bada

Bada (operating system)

Bada is an operating system for mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers. It is developed by the Samsung Electronics. Its name is derived from " ", meaning "ocean" or "sea" in Korean...

, and Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

's MeeGo among many others. Android, Bada, webOS and Maemo are built on top of Linux

Linux

, and iOS is derived from the BSD and NeXTSTEP

NEXTSTEP

NeXTSTEP was the object-oriented, multitasking operating system developed by NeXT Computer to run on its range of proprietary workstation computers, such as the NeXTcube...

operating systems, which are all related to Unix

Unix

Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...

Common software platforms

The most common mobile operating systems are:
Android from Google Inc. (free and open source)

Android was developed by a small startup company that was purchased by Google Inc., and Google continues to update the software. Android is a Linux-derived OS backed by Google, along with major hardware and software developers (such as Intel, HTC, ARM, Samsung, Motorola and eBay, to name a few), that form the Open Handset Alliance

Open Handset Alliance

. Released on November 5th 2007, the OS received praise from a number of developers upon its introduction. Android releases prior to 2.0 (1.0, 1.5, 1.6) were used exclusively on mobile phones. Most Android phones, and some Android tablets, now use a 2.x release. Android 3.0 was a tablet-oriented release and does not officially run on mobile phones. The current Android version is 4.0. Android releases are nicknamed after sweets or dessert items like Cupcake (1.5), Frozen Yogurt (2.2), Honeycomb (3.0), and Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0). Most major mobile service providers carry an Android device. Since the HTC Dream

HTC Dream

The HTC Dream is an Internet-enabled smartphone with an operating system designed by Google and hardware designed by HTC...

was introduced, there has been an explosion in the number of devices that carry Android OS. From Q2 of 2009 to the second quarter of 2010, Android's worldwide market share rose 850% from 1.8% to 17.2%. On 15 November 2011, Android reached 52.5% of the global smartphone market share.

BlackBerry OS

BlackBerry OS is a proprietary mobile operating system, developed by Research In Motion for its BlackBerry line of smartphone handheld devices...

from RIM

Research In Motion

(closed source, proprietary)

This OS is focused on easy operation and was originally designed for business

Business

A business is an organization engaged in the trade of goods, services, or both to consumers. Businesses are predominant in capitalist economies, where most of them are privately owned and administered to earn profit to increase the wealth of their owners. Businesses may also be not-for-profit...

. Recently it has seen a surge in third-party applications and has been improved to offer full multimedia support. Currently Blackberry's App World has over 50,000 downloadable applications. RIM's future strategy will focus on the newly acquired QNX

QNX

QNX is a commercial Unix-like real-time operating system, aimed primarily at the embedded systems market. The product was originally developed by Canadian company, QNX Software Systems, which was later acquired by Canadian BlackBerry-producer Research In Motion.-Description:As a microkernel-based...

, having already launched the BlackBerry PlayBook

BlackBerry PlayBook

The BlackBerry PlayBook is a tablet computer by Research In Motion , best known for the BlackBerry smartphone. It competes against Apple's iPad and a slew of Android-powered tablets....

tablet running a version of QNX and expecting the first QNX smartphones in early 2012.

iOS from Apple Inc. (closed source, proprietary, on top of open source Darwin

Darwin (operating system)

Darwin is an open source POSIX-compliant computer operating system released by Apple Inc. in 2000. It is composed of code developed by Apple, as well as code derived from NeXTSTEP, BSD, and other free software projects....

core OS)

The Apple iPhone

IPhone

, iPod Touch

IPod Touch

The iPod Touch is a portable media player, personal digital assistant, handheld game console, and Wi-Fi mobile device designed and marketed by Apple Inc. The iPod Touch adds the multi-touch graphical user interface to the iPod line...

, iPad

IPad

The iPad is a line of tablet computers designed, developed and marketed by Apple Inc., primarily as a platform for audio-visual media including books, periodicals, movies, music, games, and web content. The iPad was introduced on January 27, 2010 by Apple's then-CEO Steve Jobs. Its size and...

, and second-generation Apple TV all use an operating system called iOS, which is derived from Mac OS X

Mac OS X

Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...

. Native third party applications were not officially supported until the release of iOS 2.0 on July 11th 2008. Before this, "jailbreaking" allowed third party applications to be installed, and this method is still available. Currently all iOS devices are developed by Apple and manufactured by Foxconn

Foxconn

The Foxconn Technology Group is a multinational business group anchored by the Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd. , a Taiwan-registered corporation headquartered in Tucheng, Taiwan...

or another of Apple's partners.

Symbian OS from the Symbian Foundation (open public license)

Symbian has the largest share in most markets worldwide, but lags behind other companies in the relatively small but highly visible North American market. This matches the success of Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

in all markets except Japan. In Japan Symbian is strong due to a relationship with NTT DoCoMo

NTT DoCoMo

is the predominant mobile phone operator in Japan. The name is officially an abbreviation of the phrase, "do communications over the mobile network", and is also from a compound word dokomo, meaning "everywhere" in Japanese. Docomo provides phone, video phone , i-mode , and mail services...

, with only one of the 44 Symbian handsets released in Japan coming from Nokia. It has been used by many major handset manufacturers, including BenQ

BenQ

BenQ Corporation is a Taiwanese multi-national company that sells and markets consumer electronics, computing and communications devices under the "BenQ" brand name, which stands for the company slogan Bringing Enjoyment and Quality to life .- Company :BenQ sells and markets technology products,...

, Fujitsu

Fujitsu

is a Japanese multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is the world's third-largest IT services provider measured by revenues....

, LG

LG Group

LG Corp. is the second-largest South Korean conglomerate company following Samsung, and it is headquartered in the LG Twin Towers in Yeouido-dong, Yeongdeungpo-gu, Seoul. LG produces electronics, chemicals, and telecommunications products and operates subsidiaries like LG Electronics, LG Display,...

, Mitsubishi

Mitsubishi

The Mitsubishi Group , Mitsubishi Group of Companies, or Mitsubishi Companies is a Japanese multinational conglomerate company that consists of a range of autonomous businesses which share the Mitsubishi brand, trademark and legacy...

, Motorola

Motorola

Motorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...

, Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

, Samsung

Samsung

The Samsung Group is a South Korean multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea...

, Sharp

Sharp Corporation

is a Japanese multinational corporation that designs and manufactures electronic products. Headquartered in Abeno-ku, Osaka, Japan, Sharp employs more than 55,580 people worldwide as of June 2011. The company was founded in September 1912 and takes its name from one of its founder's first...

, and Sony Ericsson

Sony Ericsson

Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB is a joint venture established on October 1, 2001 by the Japanese consumer electronics company Sony Corporation and the Swedish telecommunications company Ericsson to manufacture mobile phones....

. Current Symbian-based devices are being made by Fujitsu

Fujitsu

is a Japanese multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is the world's third-largest IT services provider measured by revenues....

, Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

, Samsung

Samsung

The Samsung Group is a South Korean multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea...

, Sharp

Sharp Corporation

, and Sony Ericsson

Sony Ericsson

. Prior to 2009 Symbian supported multiple user interfaces, i.e. UIQ

UIQ

UIQ by UIQ Technology is a software platform based upon Symbian OS. Essentially this is a graphical user interface layer that provides additional components to the core OS, to enable the development of feature-rich mobile phones that are open to expanded capabilities through third-party...

from UIQ Technologies, S60 from Nokia, and MOAP from NTT DOCOMO. As part of the formation of the Symbian OS in 2009 these three UIs were merged into a single OS which is now fully open source

Open source

The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...

. Recently, though shipments of Symbian devices have increased, the operating system's worldwide market share has declined from over 50% to just over 40% from 2009 to 2010. Nokia handed the development of Symbian to Accenture, which will continue to support the OS until 2016.

Windows Phone

from Microsoft

Microsoft

(closed source, proprietary)

On February 15th, 2010, Microsoft unveiled its next-generation mobile OS, Windows Phone

Windows Phone

. The new mobile OS includes a completely new over-hauled UI inspired by Microsoft's "Metro Design Language

Metro Design Language

Metro is an internal code name for a typography-based design language created by Microsoft, originally for use in Windows Phone 7. Early uses of the Metro principles, such as the typography, began as early as Microsoft Encarta 95, and later evolved into products such as Windows Media Center and Zune...

". It includes full integration of Microsoft services such as Windows Live

Windows Live

Windows Live is the collective brand name for a set of services and software products from Microsoft, part of their software plus services platform. A majority of these services are Web applications, accessible from a browser, but there are also client-side binary applications that require...

, Zune

Zune

Zune is a digital media brand owned by Microsoft which includes a line of portable media players, a digital media player software for Windows machines, a music subscription service known as a 'Zune Music Pass', music and video streaming for the Xbox 360 via the Zune Software, music, TV and movie...

, Xbox Live

Xbox Live

Xbox Live is an online multiplayer gaming and digital media delivery service created and operated by Microsoft Corporation. It is currently the only online gaming service on consoles that charges users a fee to play multiplayer gaming. It was first made available to the Xbox system in 2002...

and Bing, but also integrates with many other non-Microsoft services such as Facebook

Facebook

Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...

and Google accounts

Google Account

A Google Account is a user account that provides access to Google-owned services such as Blogger, YouTube, and Google Groups. A Google Account can be identified either by the username or by their unique permanent ID...

. The new software platform has received some positive reception from the technology press.

webOS from HP (certain parts open sourced)

webOS is a proprietary mobile operating system running on the Linux kernel, initially developed by Palm, which launched with the Palm Pre

Palm Pre

The Palm Pre is a multimedia smartphone designed and marketed by Palm with a multi-touch screen and a sliding keyboard. The smartphone was the first to use Palm's Linux based mobile operating system, webOS...

. After being acquired by HP, two phones (the Veer

HP Veer

The Veer is a smartphone announced by HP on February 9, 2011. The device uses webOS, is powered by a Snapdragon processor, and has a 2.6-inch screen. The smartphone is notable for its credit card-sized dimensions...

and the Pre 3

HP Pre 3

The HP Pre 3 is a touchscreen slider smartphone manufactured by Hewlett-Packard. On February 9, 2011, the phone was announced by HP at a webOS special event held at the Fort Mason Center, San Francisco alongside the HP Veer and Touchpad. It was commercially released in the United Kingdom on...

) and a tablet (the TouchPad

HP TouchPad

The HP TouchPad is a tablet computer which was developed and designed by Hewlett-Packard. The HP TouchPad was launched on July 1, 2011, in the United States; July 15 in Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany; and August 15 in Australia....

) running webOS were introduced in 2011. On August 18th, 2011, HP announced that webOS hardware is discontinued but HP will continue to support and update webOS software and develop the webOS ecosystem.

Other software platforms

GridOS from Fusion Garage

GridOS was built using open source code from the Android kernel. It is used as the operating system of the Grid 4 mobile phone and Grid 10 tablet, which are due to start shipping September 15th 2011.

BlackBerry Tablet OS

BlackBerry Tablet OS is an operating system based on the QNX Neutrino real-time operating system designed to run Adobe AIR and BlackBerry WebWorks applications...

from QNX Software System

QNX

/RIM

Research In Motion

(closed source, proprietary)

BlackBerry Tablet OS is based on QNX. QNX is a commercial Unix-like real-time operating system, aimed primarily at the embedded systems market. The product was originally developed by Canadian company, QNX Software Systems, which was later acquired by BlackBerry-producer Research In Motion. This OS is primary for BlackBerry Playbook (tablet).

BlackBerry BBX from RIM

Research In Motion

BlackBerry BBX is the next generation platform for BlackBerry smartphones and tablets. In other words, there will be only one OS for both Blackberry smartphones and tablets going forward.

SHR

SHR (operating system)

SHR is a community-driven Linux distribution for smartphones which is based on OpenEmbedded and the framework. Several different graphical toolkits are made available, such as GTK+, Qt and more.-System requirements:...

(community-driven)

SHR is a GNU/Linux based operating system for smartphones and similar mobile devices. It integrates various Free and Open Source Software projects into a versatile platform - flexible enough to run on a vast selection of mobile hardware such as the Openmoko Neo Freerunner, Nokia N900, Palm Pre and variants, T-Mobile G1, HTC HD2, iPhone 3Gs and more. The SHR build system is based on OpenEmbedded - well known from the Yocto project. For telephony, networking, etc. freesmartphone.org framework is used. On top of that an easy to use graphical interface centered around Enlightenment libraries is used to provide phone calls, messaging and pim. A growing amount of available applications offers SHR users with everything expected on a smartphone. But also numerous classical programs well known from other Linux distros can be made available easily.

SHR is 100% community driven and based on Free and Open Source Software. This empowers everybody to realize their innovations or add support for new hardware - without needing to ask some CEO or strategy manager first.

MeeGo from non-profit organization The Linux Foundation (open source, GPL)

At the 2010 Mobile World Congress

Mobile World Congress

The GSMA Mobile World Congress is the combination of the world's largest exhibition for the mobile industry and a conference featuring prominent Chief Executives representing mobile operators, device manufacturers, technology providers, vendors and content owners from across the world...

in Barcelona, Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

and Intel both unveiled 'MeeGo' a brand new mobile operating system which would combine the best of Moblin and the best of Maemo to create a truly open-sourced experience for users across all devices. As of 2011, Nokia has announced that it will no longer be pursuing MeeGo and will instead adopt Windows Phone 7 as its primary mobile OS. Nokia announced the Nokia N9

Nokia N9

The Nokia N9 is a smartphone made by Nokia based on the MeeGo "Harmattan" mobile operating system, the first from Nokia on the MeeGo OS...

on June 21, 2011 at the Nokia Connection event in Singapore. The phone is presumed to become available to the public in September 2011. LG announced its support for the platform.

bada

Bada (operating system)

from Samsung Electronics

Samsung Electronics

Samsung Electronics is a South Korean multinational electronics and information technology company headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul...

(closed source, proprietary)

This is a mobile operating system being developed by Samsung Electronics. Samsung claims that bada will rapidly replace its proprietary feature phone platform, converting feature phones to smartphones.The name 'bada' is derived from 바다, the Korean word for ocean or sea. The first device to run bada is called 'Wave

Samsung Wave S8500

The Samsung Wave GT-S8500 is the first touchscreen smartphone running the new bada operating system designed by Samsung, which was commercially released on June 1, 2010...

' and was unveiled to the public at Mobile World Congress

Mobile World Congress

2010. The Wave is a fully touchscreen phone running the new mobile operating system. With the phone, Samsung also released an app store, called Samsung Apps, to the public. It has close to 3000 mobile applications.

Samsung has said that they don't see Bada as a smartphone operating system, but as an OS with a kernel configurable architecture, which allows the use of either a proprietary real-time operating system

Real-time operating system

A real-time operating system is an operating system intended to serve real-time application requests.A key characteristic of a RTOS is the level of its consistency concerning the amount of time it takes to accept and complete an application's task; the variability is jitter...

, or the Linux kernel. Though Samsung plans to install bada on many phones, the company still has a large lineup of Android phones.

Linux

based operating system (open source, GPL)

Linux is strongest in China where it is used by Motorola, and in Japan, used by DoCoMo. Rather than being an OS in its own right, Linux is used as a basis for a number of different operating systems developed by several vendors, including Android, GridOS, B2G

Boot 2 Gecko

Boot 2 Gecko is a proposed open source operating system in development by Mozilla Corporation, initially targeting Android-compatible smartphones.-Announcement:...

, LiMo, Maemo, MeeGo

MeeGo

MeeGo is a Linux-based open source mobile operating system project. Primarily targeted at mobile devices and information appliances in the consumer electronics market, MeeGo is designed to act as an operating system for hardware platforms such as netbooks, entry-level desktops, nettops, tablet...

, Openmoko

Openmoko Linux

Openmoko Linux is an operating system for smartphones developed by the Openmoko project. It is based on the Ångström distribution, comprising various pieces of free software.The main targets of Openmoko Linux were the Openmoko Neo 1973 and the Neo FreeRunner...

and Qt Extended, which are mostly incompatible. PalmSource

PalmSource

ACCESS Systems Americas, Inc. is a subsidiary of ACCESS which develops the Palm OS PDA operating system and its successor, the Access Linux Platform, as well as BeOS...

(now Access) is moving towards an interface running on Linux. Another software platform based on Linux is being developed by Motorola, NEC

NEC

, a Japanese multinational IT company, has its headquarters in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. NEC, part of the Sumitomo Group, provides information technology and network solutions to business enterprises, communications services providers and government....

, NTT DoCoMo, Panasonic

Panasonic

Panasonic is an international brand name for Japanese electric products manufacturer Panasonic Corporation, which was formerly known as Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd...

, Samsung, and Vodafone

Vodafone

Vodafone Group Plc is a global telecommunications company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the world's largest mobile telecommunications company measured by revenues and the world's second-largest measured by subscribers , with around 341 million proportionate subscribers as of...

Brew from Qualcomm

Qualcomm

Qualcomm is an American global telecommunication corporation that designs, manufactures and markets digital wireless telecommunications products and services based on its code division multiple access technology and other technologies. Headquartered in San Diego, CA, USA...

Brew is used by a some mobile phone manufacturers and mobile networks, however most often the end-user does not know this since mobile phones running Brew most often lack any Brew branding. Brew runs in the background with the custom "skins" of the mobile phone manufacturer or operator on-top. Brew is used by Sprint Nextel, metroPCS, U.S. Cellular and Verizon in the US and by the Three network in much of Europe, the UK and Australia on many mobile phones produced especially for their network. Manufacturers such as Huawei, INQ Mobile, Amoi, and Samsung Mobile amongst others use Brew in some of their mobile phones and it is featured in Three UK phones such as the 3 Skypephone, INQ1 and Huawei u7510 (3 Touch). Two of HTC's mobile phones use Brew's successor Brew MP.

LiMo 4 from LiMo Foundation

LiMo Foundation

The LiMo Foundation is an non-profit technology consortium organization dedicated to creating the first truly open, hardware-independent, Linux-based mobile operating system for smartphone mobile devices...

LiMo Foundation launched LiMo 4 on 14 february 2011, the latest release of the LiMo Platform. LiMo 4 delivers complete middleware and base application functionality, including a flexible user interface, extended widget libraries, 3D window effects, advanced multimedia, social networking and location based service frameworks, sensor frameworks, multi-tasking and multi-touch capabilities. In addition, support for scalable screen resolution and consistent APIs means that the platform can deliver a consistent user experience across a broad range of device types and form factors

Historical software platforms

Maemo

Maemo is a software platform developed by the Maemo community for smartphones and Internet tablets. It is based on the Debian Linux distribution, but has no relation to it...

from Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

(open source, GPL)

Maemo is a software platform developed by Nokia for smartphone

Smartphone

s and Internet tablet

Internet Tablet

Nokia Internet Tablets is the name given to a range of Nokia mobile Internet appliances products. These tablets fall in the range between a personal digital assistant and an Ultra-Mobile PC , and slightly below Intel's Mobile Internet device .- Maemo :Nokia Internet Tablets run the Debian...

s. It is based on the Debian

Debian

Debian is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential...

operating system

Operating system

Maemo is mostly based on open source

Open source

code, and has been developed by Maemo Devices within Nokia in collaboration with many open source projects such as the Linux kernel

Linux kernel

The Linux kernel is an operating system kernel used by the Linux family of Unix-like operating systems. It is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software....

, Debian and GNOME

GNOME

GNOME is a desktop environment and graphical user interface that runs on top of a computer operating system. It is composed entirely of free and open source software...

Maemo is based on Debian GNU/Linux and draws much of its GUI

Gui

Gui or guee is a generic term to refer to grilled dishes in Korean cuisine. These most commonly have meat or fish as their primary ingredient, but may in some cases also comprise grilled vegetables or other vegetarian ingredients. The term derives from the verb, "gupda" in Korean, which literally...

, frameworks

Software framework

In computer programming, a software framework is an abstraction in which software providing generic functionality can be selectively changed by user code, thus providing application specific software...

and libraries from the GNOME project. It uses the Matchbox

Matchbox (window manager)

Matchbox is a free and open source window manager for the X Window System. It is mainly intended for embedded systems and differs from most other window managers in that it only shows one window at a time...

window manager and the GTK-based Hildon

Hildon

Hildon is an application framework originally developed for mobile devices running the Linux operating system. It was developed by Nokia for the Maemo operating system and is now a part of GNOME. It focuses on providing a finger-friendly interface...

as its GUI and application framework

Application framework

In computer programming, an application framework consists of a software framework used by software developers to implement the standard structure of an application for a specific development environment ....

Windows Mobile

Windows Mobile is a mobile operating system developed by Microsoft that was used in smartphones and Pocket PCs, but by 2011 was rarely supplied on new phones. The last version is "Windows Mobile 6.5.5"; it is superseded by Windows Phone, which does not run Windows Mobile software.Windows Mobile is...

from Microsoft

Microsoft

(closed source, proprietary)

The Windows CE

Windows CE

Microsoft Windows CE is an operating system developed by Microsoft for embedded systems. Windows CE is a distinct operating system and kernel, rather than a trimmed-down version of desktop Windows...

operating system and Windows Mobile middleware are widely spread in Asia. The two improved variants of this operating system, Windows Mobile 6 Professional (for touch screen devices) and Windows Mobile 6 Standard, were unveiled in February 2007. It has been criticized for having a user interface which is not optimized for touch input by fingers; instead, it is more usable with a stylus

Stylus (computing)

In computing, a stylus is a small pen-shaped instrument that is used to input commands to a computer screen, mobile device or graphics tablet...

. However, unlike iPhone OS, it does support both touch screen and physical keyboard configurations.

Windows Mobile's market share has sharply declined in recent years to just 5% in Q2 of 2010. Microsoft is phasing out the Windows Mobile OS to specialized markets and is instead focusing on its new operating system and software platform, Windows Phone.

Palm OS/Garnet OS

Palm OS

Palm OS is a mobile operating system initially developed by Palm, Inc., for personal digital assistants in 1996. Palm OS is designed for ease of use with a touchscreen-based graphical user interface. It is provided with a suite of basic applications for personal information management...

from Access Co.

Access Co.

, founded in April 1979 and incorporated in February 1984 in Tokyo, Japan, by Arakawa Toru and Kamada Tomihisa, is a company providing a variety of software for connected and mobile devices, such as mobile phones, PDAs, video game consoles and set top boxes....

(closed source, proprietary)

webOS was introduced by Palm in January 2009 as the successor to Palm OS with Web 2.0 technologies, open architecture, and multitasking capabilities.

DangerOS from Danger, Inc.

Danger (company)

Danger, Inc. was a company specializing in platforms, software, design, and services for mobile computing devices. Its most notable product was the T-Mobile Sidekick ....

(closed source, proprietary)

DangerOS was a largely Java

Java (programming language)

Java is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...

-based operating system for the Danger Hiptop

Danger Hiptop

The Danger Hiptop, also re-branded as the T-Mobile Sidekick, Mobiflip and Sharp Jump is a GPRS/EDGE/UMTS smartphone produced by Danger Incorporated from 2002 to 2010....

line of smartphones produced by Danger Incorporated

Danger (company)

Danger, Inc. was a company specializing in platforms, software, design, and services for mobile computing devices. Its most notable product was the T-Mobile Sidekick ....

from 2002 to 2010, also sold as the T-Mobile Sidekick. In 2008, Danger, Inc. was acquired by Microsoft. Former Danger, Inc. employees were tasked to work on the Microsoft Kin line of phones, and in 2010 DangerOS was discontinued as a smartphone platform after the Kin phones were released. In 2011 T-Mobile introduced a new smartphone using the Sidekick branding based on Google's Android platform, with no relation to the previous Danger Hiptop phones.

Nucleus

Nucleus RTOS

Nucleus OS is a real-time operating system and toolset created by the Embedded Systems Division of Mentor Graphics for various central processing unit platforms. Nucleus OS is an embedded software solution and is in an estimated 2.11 billion devices worldwide.Development is typically done on a...

from Mentor Graphics

Mentor Graphics

Mentor Graphics, Inc is a US-based multinational corporation dealing in electronic design automation for electrical engineering and electronics, as of 2004, ranked third in the EDA industry it helped create...

(closed source)

Nucleus OS is a real-time operating system (RTOS) and toolset created by the Embedded Systems Division of Mentor Graphics for various central processing unit (CPU) platforms. The Nucleus RTOS is designed for embedded systems applications including consumer electronics, set-top boxes, cellular phones, and other portable and handheld devices. For limited memory systems Nucleus RTOS can be scaled down to a memory footprint as small as 13 KB for both code and data. Manufacturers such as Motorola, Samsung, LG, Siemens/Benq, Sagem, Pantech, and NEC use Nucleus in some of their mobile phones. The last devices released that used Nucleus OS are LG Encore (GT550), LG Prime (GS390), and Pantech Pursuit (P9020).

Future software platforms

Boot 2 Gecko

Boot 2 Gecko is a proposed open source operating system in development by Mozilla Corporation, initially targeting Android-compatible smartphones.-Announcement:...

from non-profit organization Mozilla Foundation

Mozilla Foundation

The Mozilla Foundation is a non-profit organization that exists to support and provide leadership for the open source Mozilla project. The organization sets the policies that govern development, operates key infrastructure and controls trademarks and other intellectual property...

(open source, GPL)

According to Ars Technica

Ars Technica

Ars Technica is a technology news and information website created by Ken Fisher and Jon Stokes in 1998. It publishes news, reviews and guides on issues such as computer hardware and software, science, technology policy, and video games. Ars Technica is known for its features, long articles that go...

, "Mozilla says that B2G is motivated by a desire to demonstrate that the standards-based open Web has the potential to be a competitive alternative to the existing single-vendor application development stacks offered by the dominant mobile operating systems."

Aliyun OS from Alibaba/AliCloud (cloud based)

AliCloud's operating system revolves around the idea of bringing cloud functionality to the mobile platform. According to the company, Aliyun will feature cloud-based e-mail, Web search, weather updates, and GPS navigation tools. In addition, the operating system will synchronize and store call data, text messages, and photos in the cloud for access across other devices, including PCs. Alibaba says it will offer customers 100GB of storage at launch. the operating system would allow users to access applications from the Web, rather than download apps to their devices.

Tizen

Tizen is a free and open source Linux-based mobile operating system project sponsored by the non-profit technology consortia Linux Foundation and LiMo Foundation. Tizen was born out of MeeGo, which was itself a combination of the mobile operating systems Moblin, created by Intel, and Maemo, created...

from non-profit organization The Linux Foundation (open source, GPL)

Tizen is an open source project hosted by the Linux Foundation

Linux Foundation

The Linux Foundation is a non-profit technology consortium chartered to foster the growth of Linux.Founded in 2007 by the merger of the Open Source Development Labs and the Free Standards Group , the Linux Foundation sponsors the work of Linux creator Linus Torvalds and is supported by leading...

, with Intel and Samsung leading its development steering group, and support from the LiMo Foundation

LiMo Foundation

. According to Intel, Tizen “combines the best of LiMo and MeeGo." HTML5 apps will be emphasized for the new OS, with the MeeGo project encouraging its members to transition to Tizen, stating that the "future belongs to HTML5-based applications, outside of a relatively small percentage of apps, and we are firmly convinced that our investment needs to shift toward HTML5." Tizen will be targeted at a variety of platforms such as handsets, tablets, smart TVs and in-vehicle entertainment. The initial release of Tizen is targeted for Q1 2012, with the first devices using the OS planned to reach the market in mid 2012.

Meltemi

Meltemi commonly refers to:* Meltemi , for mobile devices* Etesian, for winds...

from Nokia (open source, GPL)

Meltemi is an open source project hosted by Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

Windows 8

Windows 8 is the codename for the next version of the Microsoft Windows computer operating system following Windows 7. It has many changes from previous versions. In particular it adds support for ARM microprocessors in addition to the previously supported x86 microprocessors from Intel and AMD...

from Microsoft (closed source, properitary)

Microsoft announced that Windows 8 will support tablet devices as well as PCs.

Smartphone operating systems' market share

Source	Year	Symbian	Android	RIM BlackBerry OS BlackBerry OS is a proprietary mobile operating system, developed by Research In Motion for its BlackBerry line of smartphone handheld devices...	iOS	Microsoft Windows Phone 7 Windows Phone is a mobile operating system developed by Microsoft, and is the successor to its Windows Mobile platform, although incompatible with it. Unlike its predecessor, it is primarily aimed at the consumer market rather than the enterprise market...	Bada Bada Bada is a South Korean K-pop singer. Her birth name is Choi Sung-hee. Bada studied Korean traditional vocal music at Dankook University. As the former lead vocal from the now defunct S.E.S., Bada has released three solo albums and two singles. Before the release of her third album, Bada started a...	Other OSs
Gartner	2011 Q3	16.9%	52.5%	11.0%	15.0%	1.5%	2.2%	0.9%
Gartner	2011 Q2	22.1%	43.4%	11.7%	18.2%	1.6%	1.9%	1.0%
Gartner	2011 Q1	27.4%	36.0%	12.9%	16.8%	3.6%	N/A	3.3%
Gartner	2010	37.6%	22.7%	16.0%	15.7%	4.2%	N/A	3.8%
Gartner	2009	46.9%	3.9%	19.9%	14.4%	8.7%	N/A	6.1%
Gartner	2008	52.4%	0.5%	16.6%	8.2%	11.8%	N/A	10.5%
Gartner	2007	63.5%	N/A	9.6%	2.7%	12.0%	N/A	12.1%

Total mobile OS market share including tablets and connected devices

The disparity between the U.S. installed base of iOS at 43.1% and its share of browser-based page views at 58.5% suggests that iOS users are heavier-than-average consumers of Internet content. Additionally, in August 2011, 97.2% of all tablet Internet traffic in the U.S. was delivered to iPads.

Mobile OS comparison

Only the latest versions are shown in this table, even though old versions may still be marketed.

Legend
width="100"	width="100" Tablet-only	width="100"	width="100"	width="100" 3rd party	width="100"

Feature	iOS	Android	webOS	Windows Mobile	Windows Phone	BlackBerry OS	Symbian	Maemo	MeeGo	bada
Company	Apple	Open Handset Alliance/Google	Palm, Inc (HP)	Microsoft	Microsoft	RIM	Symbian Foundation	Nokia	Linux Foundation	Samsung
Current Version	5.0.1	4.0.1	2.1.2 (Phones) 3.0.2 (Tablet)	6.5.3	7.5	7.0.0	9.5	5.0	1.1.2	2.0
OS Family	Darwin Darwin (operating system) Darwin is an open source POSIX-compliant computer operating system released by Apple Inc. in 2000. It is composed of code developed by Apple, as well as code derived from NeXTSTEP, BSD, and other free software projects....	Linux Linux Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...	Linux	Windows CE Windows CE Microsoft Windows CE is an operating system developed by Microsoft for embedded systems. Windows CE is a distinct operating system and kernel, rather than a trimmed-down version of desktop Windows... 5.2	Windows CE 7	Mobile OS	Mobile OS	Linux	Linux	Proprietary RTOS Real-time operating system A real-time operating system is an operating system intended to serve real-time application requests.A key characteristic of a RTOS is the level of its consistency concerning the amount of time it takes to accept and complete an application's task; the variability is jitter... or Linux
Supported CPU Architecture	ARM ARM architecture ARM is a 32-bit reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by ARM Holdings. It was named the Advanced RISC Machine, and before that, the Acorn RISC Machine. The ARM architecture is the most widely used 32-bit ISA in numbers produced...	ARM, MIPS MIPS architecture MIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit... , Power Architecture Power Architecture Power Architecture is a broad term to describe similar RISC instruction sets for microprocessors developed and manufactured by such companies as IBM, Freescale, AMCC, Tundra and P.A. Semi... , x86	ARM	ARM	ARM	ARM	ARM	ARM	ARM, x86	ARM
Programmed in	C C (programming language) C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system.... , C++ C++ C++ is a statically typed, free-form, multi-paradigm, compiled, general-purpose programming language. It is regarded as an intermediate-level language, as it comprises a combination of both high-level and low-level language features. It was developed by Bjarne Stroustrup starting in 1979 at Bell... , Objective-C Objective-C Objective-C is a reflective, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.Today, it is used primarily on Apple's Mac OS X and iOS: two environments derived from the OpenStep standard, though not compliant with it...	C, C++, Java Java (programming language) Java is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...	C	C++	Many, .NET .NET Framework The .NET Framework is a software framework that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It includes a large library and supports several programming languages which allows language interoperability... (Silverlight Microsoft Silverlight Microsoft Silverlight is an application framework for writing and running rich Internet applications, with features and purposes similar to those of Adobe Flash. The run-time environment for Silverlight is available as a plug-in for web browsers running under Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X... /XNA Microsoft XNA Microsoft XNA is a set of tools with a managed runtime environment provided by Microsoft that facilitates video game development and management. XNA attempts to free game developers from writing "repetitive boilerplate code" and to bring different aspects of game production into a single system... )	Java	C++	C/C++	C++	C++
License	Proprietary EULA except for open source components	Free and open source	Free and open source except closed source modules	Proprietary	Proprietary	Proprietary	Eclipse Public License	Free and open source except closed source components	Free and open source	Proprietary
Public issues list	No, But there is an unofficial tracker				No, but there is a unofficial collection
Package manager Package management system In software, a package management system, also called package manager, is a collection of software tools to automate the process of installing, upgrading, configuring, and removing software packages for a computer's operating system in a consistent manner...	iTunes ITunes iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....	APK APK (file format) Android application package file is the file format used to distribute and install application software and middleware onto the Google's Android operating system. To make an APK file, a program for Android is first compiled, and then all of its parts are packaged into one file...	App Catalog (Official) Preware (3rd party homebrew)	Windows Mobile Device Center Windows Mobile Device Center Windows Mobile Device Center is a synchronization software program developed by Microsoft, and the successor to ActiveSync. It is designed to synchronize various content including music, video, contacts, calendar events, web browser favorites, and other files between Windows Mobile devices and the... /ActiveSync ActiveSync ActiveSync is a mobile data synchronization technology and protocol developed by Microsoft, originally released in 1996. There are two implementations of the technology: one which synchronizes data and information with handheld devices with a specific desktop computer , and another technology,...	Zune Software Zune Software The Zune software functions as management software for Windows Phone 7, Zune devices, and Microsoft Kin, a full media player application with a library, an interface to the Zune Marketplace, and as a media streaming server. Zune Software is used to sync with all devices with Zune functionality....	BlackBerry Desktop Manager	Nokia Ovi Suite	dpkg+apt-get	rpm+yum+zypper	?
Wireless system updates
Multi-user Multi-user Multi-user is a term that defines an operating system or application software that allows concurrent access by multiple users of a computer. Time-sharing systems are multi-user systems. Most batch processing systems for mainframe computers may also be considered "multi-user", to avoid leaving the...
Guest Mode		No, but possible with 3rd party ROM MIUI MIUI MIUI , developed by Xiaomi Tech, is an aftermarket firmware for cell phones based on the open-source Android operating system. It features a heavily-modified user interface that does away with the Android app drawer and has drawn comparisons with Apple's iOS...
Per application runtime modifiable permissions	Notifications in 5+	No, only Background Data Usage on 4+, more with 3rd party firmwares		?			?	?	?	?
Parental controls Parental controls Parental controls are features which may be included in digital television services, computer and video games, mobile phones and computer software...		3rd party software	?	?	?	?	?	?	?	?
Remote device location tracking		3rd party software	?	?			?	?	?	?
Remote device locking and/or data wipe								?	?	?
Non English languages support
Underlining spell checker Spell checker In computing, a spell checker is an application program that flags words in a document that may not be spelled correctly. Spell checkers may be stand-alone capable of operating on a block of text, or as part of a larger application, such as a word processor, email client, electronic dictionary,...				?					?
Built-in system-wide dictionary		No, available on selected devices	?	?	?		?	?	?	?
Autoexpanding text replacements		?		?	?		?	?	?	?
Emoji Emoji is the Japanese term for the picture characters or emoticons used in Japanese electronic messages and webpages. Originally meaning pictograph, the word literally means e "picture" + moji "letter". The characters are used much like emoticons elsewhere, but a wider range is provided, and the icons... support		?	?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Accessibility Accessibility Accessibility is a general term used to describe the degree to which a product, device, service, or environment is available to as many people as possible. Accessibility can be viewed as the "ability to access" and benefit from some system or entity... features		?	?	?			?	?	?	?
Search multiple internal applications at once									?
Core applications missing search	Bookmarks	Calendar (available since 3+ and HTC Sense HTC Sense HTC Sense is a graphical user interface developed by HTC Corporation for mobile devices running Android, Brew and Windows Mobile.Based on the TouchFLO 3D design, HTC has referred to HTC Sense as both a user interface in itself and also as a user experience layer on top of TouchFLO 3D.Announced June... )	?	?	Text Messages nor Calendar, nor Music nor Video
Search all fields of internal objects						Search on notes body and contacts notes field was removed on OS6			?
Proxy server Proxy server In computer networks, a proxy server is a server that acts as an intermediary for requests from clients seeking resources from other servers. A client connects to the proxy server, requesting some service, such as a file, connection, web page, or other resource available from a different server...		but only global, not per connection							?
On-device encryption Encryption In cryptography, encryption is the process of transforming information using an algorithm to make it unreadable to anyone except those possessing special knowledge, usually referred to as a key. The result of the process is encrypted information...	(3rd party software may attempt brute-force attacks on password)					(3rd party software may attempt brute force attacks on password)			?
External storage encryption	External storage not supported		External storage not supported	?	External storage not supported			?	?
Cloud encrypted storage			?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Sync to Cloud communication encryption			?	?			?	3rd party software	?	?
Desktop Sync		No, but available on HTC Sense HTC Sense HTC Sense is a graphical user interface developed by HTC Corporation for mobile devices running Android, Brew and Windows Mobile.Based on the TouchFLO 3D design, HTC has referred to HTC Sense as both a user interface in itself and also as a user experience layer on top of TouchFLO 3D.Announced June...	3rd party software
Local Full backup		No, but possible with rooted devices and 3rd party software				and memory card (7+)		?	?
Core Data missing Sync		Bookmarks (before 4), SMSs and Settings			Favorites, Text Messages and Settings
cut, copy, and paste									?
undo Undo Undo is a command in many computer programs. It erases the last change done to the document reverting it to an older state. In some more advanced programs such as graphic processing, undo will negate the last command done to the file being edited....									?
Visual voicemail Visual voicemail Visual voicemail is random access voicemail with a visual interface. Such an interface presents a list of messages for playback and may include a transcript of each message. In recent months, several companies in the telecommunications space have integrated a visual element into their voicemail...			?	?			?	?	?	?
Call log duration			?	?				?	?	?
Contact Groups	3rd party software	or 3rd party software	?	?				?	?	?
Phone number linking to dialer									?
Addresses link to maps		nor in Gmail	?	?		?		?	?	?
Dates link to calendar			?	?	?	?	?	?	?	?
Default Web Browser/Engine	Webkit WebKit WebKit is a layout engine designed to allow web browsers to render web pages. WebKit powers Google Chrome and Apple Safari and by October 2011 held over 33% of the browser market share between them. It is also used as the basis for the experimental browser included with the Amazon Kindle ebook...	Webkit	Webkit	Trident Trident (layout engine) Trident is the name of the layout engine for the Microsoft Windows version of Internet Explorer.It was first introduced with the release of Internet Explorer version 4.0 in October 1997; it has been steadily upgraded and remains in use today...	Trident	Webkit	Webkit	Gecko Gecko (layout engine) Gecko is a free and open source layout engine used in many applications developed by Mozilla Foundation and the Mozilla Corporation , as well as in many other open source software projects....	Webkit	Webkit
Browser direct Internet connection (increased resilience to outages)						, routes through BlackBerry Internet Service BlackBerry Internet Service The BlackBerry Internet Service is a service that provides BlackBerry smartphone users with access to Internet browsing, allows email messaging, instant messaging using the BlackBerry Messenger service, and more.The service also allows... . Direct browsing supported over WiFi
Browser keeps windows open on shutdown or crash						?	?		?
Browser Search Engine options	Bing Bing Bing is a web search engine from Microsoft.Bing may also refer to:* An onomatopœia of a bell sound* Bing cherry, a variety of cherry* Bing , Chinese flatbread* Bing , a German company that manufactured toys and kitchen utensils... , Google Google search Google or Google Web Search is a web search engine owned by Google Inc. Google Search is the most-used search engine on the World Wide Web, receiving several hundred million queries each day through its various services.... , Yahoo! Search Yahoo! Search Yahoo! Search is a web search engine, owned by Yahoo! Inc. and was , the 2nd largest search engine on the web by query volume, at 6.42%, after its competitor Google at 85.35% and before Baidu at 3.67%, according to Net Applications....	Many	Many	?	Bing, Google	Google, Bing, Yahoo, Wikipedia, Dictionary.com, User Defined	Google	?	?	?
Browser Find on Page			?	?				?	?	?
Browser/Email Save Images			?	?				?	?	?
Browser/Email Save PDFs			?	?				?	?	?
Browser Save Audio/Video				?			?	?	?	?
Browser Save Page	Any page in 5+			?				?	?	?
Browser Text Reflow	; 3rd party browsers on prior versions			?				?	?
Browser Reader Mode		?	?	?	?	PlayBook OS 2.0	?	?	?	?
Browser file upload	3rd party software	but crashes on big files	?	?				?	?
Browser form navigation			?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Browser Private Browsing mode		or with rooted devices and 3rd party firmware	?	?	3rd party software	?	?	?	?	?
Official Application Store	App Store	Android Market Android Market Android Market is an online software store developed by Google for Android OS devices. Its gateway is an application program called "Market", preinstalled on most Android devices, allows users to browse and download mobile apps published by third-party developers...	App Catalog	Windows Marketplace for Mobile Windows Marketplace for Mobile Windows Marketplace for Mobile is a service by Microsoft for its Windows Mobile platform that allows users to browse and download applications that have been developed by third parties. The service was available for use directly on Windows Mobile 6.x devices and on personal computers...	Windows Phone Marketplace Windows Phone Marketplace Windows Phone Marketplace is a service by Microsoft for its Windows Phone 7 platform that allows users to browse and download applications that have been developed by third-parties...	App World	Symbian Horizon, Ovi store	maemo.org, Ovi store	?	Samsung Apps
Non-discriminatory Stores	Apple discriminates based on country and own Apple policies	?	Discriminates by country. Can be circumvented via homebrew	?	Discriminates by country	3rd party software	?	?	?	?
Unified Inbox								?	?
Email Sync protocols supported	POP3, IMAP, MAPI	POP3, IMAP, MAPI	POP3, IMAP, MAPI	POP3, IMAP, MAPI	POP3, IMAP, MAPI	BES, BIS, Push e-mail	POP3, IMAP	POP3, IMAP, Exchange	POP3, IMAP	POP3, IMAP
Non-intrusive Notifications				?						?
Push Notifications				?
End-to-end Encrypted End-to-end encryption End-to-end encryption encrypts clear data at source with knowledge of the intended recipient, allowing the encrypted data to travel safely through vulnerable channels End-to-end encryption (E2EE) encrypts clear (red) data at source with knowledge of the intended recipient, allowing the encrypted... Push Notifications			?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Screen orientation lock			?	?		3rd party software		?	?	?
Custom Home and Lock Screen wallpaper			?	?				?	?	?
Separate volume for Ringtone and Media			?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Custom Ringtones								3rd party software	?
Custom SMS/MMS tones				?				?	?	?
Custom Vibrate Alert patterns			?	?	?		?	?	?	?
Non-carrier-based integrated messaging	(iMessage IMessage iMessage is an instant messenger application developed by Apple for iOS 5. iMessage was released on October 12, 2011 to the general public.-History:iMessage was announced by Scott Forstall at his keynote speech on June 6, 2011 at the WWDC 2011... )			?				?	?	?
Offline Voice Commands
Voice Recognition	(Siri Siri (software) Siri is an intelligent software assistant and knowledge navigator functioning as a personal assistant application for iOS. The application uses a natural language user interface to answer questions, make recommendations, and perform actions by delegating requests to a set of web services... on iPhone 4S IPhone 4S The iPhone 4S is a touchscreen slate smartphone developed by Apple Inc. It is the fifth generation of the iPhone, a device that combines a widescreen iPod with a touchscreen, mobile phone, and internet communicator. It retains the exterior design of its predecessor, iPhone 4, but is host to a range... )
Non-English Voice Recognition			?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Sound Recorder		and not voice controlled)	3rd party software	?	3rd party software; Very limited (Doesn't work in background and not voice controlled)			3rd party software	?	?
Call Recorder		Prevented by OS restrictions, but possible with 3rd party firmware						3rd party software	?	?
Camera tap-to-focus			?	?		?	?	?		?
On device picture info (including Exif data)				?		?		?	?	?
On device picture categorization			3.0+	?				?	?	?
On device picture description and search			?	?		?	, Allows setting a description, but search will not use it	?	?	?
Turn off shutter sound				?		?		?	?	?
Picture crop			3rd party software	?	3rd party software	?			?
Photo red-eye reduction			?	?	3rd party software	?		?	?	?
HDR High dynamic range imaging In image processing, computer graphics, and photography, high dynamic range imaging is a set of techniques that allows a greater dynamic range between the lightest and darkest areas of an image than current standard digital imaging techniques or photographic methods... photos option		No, 3rd party software available	?	?	?	?	?	?	?	?
Photo/video import from memory cards			?	?	?			?	?	?
Video trim		No, but 3rd party software available.		?		?		?	?
Sound trim		No, but 3rd party software available		?		?	?	?	?	?
Tethering	Bluetooth, USB (carrier dependent), Personal Hotspot (Wi-Fi Tethering) (carrier dependent, iPhone 4 & 4S since iOS 4.2.5/4.3, or with 3rd party software and "jailbreak")	Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot, USB, Bluetooth	Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot (officially AT&T AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications corporation headquartered in Whitacre Tower, Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the largest provider of mobile telephony and fixed telephony in the United States, and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services... and Verizon Wireless Verizon Wireless Cellco Partnership, doing business as Verizon Wireless, is one of the largest mobile network operators in the United States. The network has 107.7 million subscribers as of 2011, making it the largest wireless service provider in America.... only). USB, Bluetooth, and Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot via homebrew	USB, Bluetooth, Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot (with 3rd party software)	Internet Sharing (Wi-Fi Hotspot)	USB, Bluetooth, Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot	USB, Bluetooth, Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot (with 3rd party software)	microUSB, Bluetooth, Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot		microUSB, Bluetooth 3.0, Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot
USB On-The-Go USB On-The-Go USB On-The-Go, often abbreviated USB OTG, is a specification that allows USB devices such as digital audio players or mobile phones to act as a host allowing a USB Flash Drive, mouse, or keyboard to be attached.- Architecture :...				?		?		?	?	?
Interchangeable external memory cards
Text/Document Support	Microsoft Office, iWork, PDF, Images, TXT/RTF, VCF	Microsoft Office 2003/2007, PDF, Images, TXT/RTF	Microsoft Office, PDF	Microsoft Office Mobile, PDF	Microsoft Office Mobile, PDF	Microsoft Office, PDF, OpenDocument	Microsoft Office Mobile, PDF, djvu	text files, PDF, HTML, Multiple office formats with free 3rd party software		Read only: text files, PDF, HTML, Multiple office formats
Printer support		No built-in function, but have apps use Google Cloud Pint available for 2.0+		?	No, but 3rd party software available	?	?	?	?	?
Audio Playback	AAC (8 to 320 Kbps), Protected AAC (from iTunes Store), HE-AAC, MP3 (8 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Apple Lossless, AIFF, WAV	AAC LC/LTP 3GPP, HE-AACv1 (AAC+) (before Android2.1), HE-AACv2 (enhanced AAC+)(before Android2.1), AMR-NB, AMR-WB, MP3 (Mono/Stereo 8-320 Kbps constant or variable bit-rate), MIDI (Type 0 and 1, DLS versions 1 and 2), Ogg Vorbis, PCM/WAVE (8- and 16-bit linear PCM, rates up to limit of hardware), WAVE	MP3, AAC, AAC+, AMR, QCELP, WAV		MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WAV, WMA pro, AMR-NB, MIDI	MP3, WAVE, WMA, AAC+, MIDI, AMR, eAAC+, FLAC, OGG	All	All (some require optional debian packages)		MP3, AAC, WMA, M4A, XMF, 3GA, MMF, MIDI, WAV, AMR
Video Playback	H.264 AVC, MPEG-4, M-JPEG	H.263, H.264 AVC, MPEG-4 SP, DivX, XviD, VP8	MPEG-4, H.263, H.264		H.263, H.264, WMV, MPEG4, MPEG4 @ HD 720p 30fps, DivX, XviD	MP4, WMV, H.263, H.264, DivX, WMV, XviD, 3gp	H.263, H.264, WMV, MPEG4, MPEG4 @ HD 720p 30fps, MKV, DivX, XviD	All (some require optional debian packages)		WMV, ASF, MP4, 3GP, AVI
Wired video out	or VGA, 576p/480p via component or composite; 1080p on iPad 2 or iPhone 4S IPhone 4S The iPhone 4S is a touchscreen slate smartphone developed by Apple Inc. It is the fifth generation of the iPhone, a device that combines a widescreen iPod with a touchscreen, mobile phone, and internet communicator. It retains the exterior design of its predecessor, iPhone 4, but is host to a range... in 5+			?	?				?	?
Wireless video/audio streaming to set top boxes/TVs/speakers		No, DLNA Digital Living Network Alliance The Digital Living Network Alliance is a non-profit collaborative trade organization established by Sony in June 2003, and has more than 250 member companies in the mobile, consumer electronics, PC, and service provider industries... available on selected devices	?	?	No, Play To (DLNA Digital Living Network Alliance The Digital Living Network Alliance is a non-profit collaborative trade organization established by Sony in June 2003, and has more than 250 member companies in the mobile, consumer electronics, PC, and service provider industries... ) available on some devices	?	?	?	?
Media player on-device playlist creation			?	?			?	?	?	?
Media Player Fine Scrubbing		3rd party software		?		?	?	?	?	?
Media Player Double Speed Playing		3rd party software	?	?		?	?	?	?	?
Turn-by-turn Turn-by-turn navigation Turn-by-turn navigation is a feature of some GPS navigation devices where directions for a selected route are continually presented to the user in the form of spoken and visual instructions. The system keeps the user up-to-date about the best route to the destination, and is often updated according... GPS	3rd party software	as it only downloads a 10-mile radius) or 3rd party software	Carrier software, 3rd party software	3rd party software	and 3rd party software	3rd party software
Alternative routes in maps			?	?	3rd party software	?	?	?	?	?
Multitasking
Record video with voice while calling		(Not available on some devices)	?	?		?		?	?	?
Desktop interactive widgets
Lock screen widgets	voicemail, camera		?	?	?	?	?	?	?	?
Notification view widgets	3rd party software with "jailbreak"	?	3.0+	3rd party firmware		?		?	?	?
Bluetooth Bluetooth Bluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks with high levels of security... keyboard		; previous versions via 3rd party software							?	?
USB keyboard			?	?	?	?		?	?	?
Videoconference front video camera	(iPhone 4 & 4S, iPod touch 4th generation, iPad 2; can connect to Macs with webcams)
Direct file transfer	Bluetooth using 3rd party software on jailbroken devices	, Wi-Fi Direct Wi-Fi Direct Wi-Fi Direct is a standard that allows Wi-Fi devices to talk to each other without the need for wireless access points .-Basic Wi-Fi:... 4+ and selected devices and NFC Near Field Communication Near field communication, or NFC, allows for simplified transactions, data exchange, and wireless connections between two devices in proximity to each other, usually by no more than a few centimeters. It is expected to become a widely used system for making payments by smartphone in the United States... (small data) 4+								Wi-Fi Direct Wi-Fi Direct Wi-Fi Direct is a standard that allows Wi-Fi devices to talk to each other without the need for wireless access points .-Basic Wi-Fi:... 2+ and NFC Near Field Communication Near field communication, or NFC, allows for simplified transactions, data exchange, and wireless connections between two devices in proximity to each other, usually by no more than a few centimeters. It is expected to become a widely used system for making payments by smartphone in the United States... (small data) 2+
Voice over IP Voice over IP Voice over Internet Protocol is a family of technologies, methodologies, communication protocols, and transmission techniques for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol networks, such as the Internet...		or 3rd party software (like Skype Skype Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice and video calls and chat over the Internet. Calls to other users within the Skype service are free, while calls to both traditional landline telephones and mobile phones can be made for a fee using a debit-based user account system... )		3rd party software (like fring)		3rd party software			?
SSH Secure Shell Secure Shell is a network protocol for secure data communication, remote shell services or command execution and other secure network services between two networked computers that it connects via a secure channel over an insecure network: a server and a client...					3rd party software		?			?
OpenVPN OpenVPN OpenVPN is a free and open source software application that implements virtual private network techniques for creating secure point-to-point or site-to-site connections in routed or bridged configurations and remote access facilities. It uses a custom security protocol that utilizes SSL/TLS for...	?	No, but possible with 3rd party firmware		Remote Desktop	?		3rd party software			?
WPA Wi-Fi Protected Access Wi-Fi Protected Access and Wi-Fi Protected Access II are two security protocols and security certification programs developed by the Wi-Fi Alliance to secure wireless computer networks... PEAP Protected Extensible Authentication Protocol The Protected Extensible Authentication Protocol, also known as Protected EAP or simply PEAP, is a protocol that encapsulates the Extensible Authentication Protocol within an encrypted and authenticated Transport Layer Security tunnel...				?		?	?	?	?	?
Remote Frame Buffer RFB Protocol RFB is a simple protocol for remote access to graphical user interfaces. Because it works at the framebuffer level it is applicable to all windowing systems and applications, including X11, Windows and Macintosh...	?			?	?	?	?			?
Screenshot Screenshot A screenshot , screen capture , screen dump, screengrab , or print screen is an image taken by a computer to record the visible items displayed on the monitor, television, or another visual output device...					No, but possible through homebrew or SDK.	3rd party software			?
GPU Graphics processing unit A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display... Accelerated GUI Graphical user interface In computing, a graphical user interface is a type of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices with images rather than text commands. GUIs can be used in computers, hand-held devices such as MP3 players, portable media players or gaming devices, household appliances and...						, OS 7.0+			?	?
Official SDK platform(s)	Mac OS X using iOS SDK	Linux, Mac OS X and Windows	Linux, Mac OS X and Windows	Windows	Windows	Windows, Mac OS X	Windows using Symbian SDK or Linux, Mac OS X and Windows using Nokia Qt SDK	GNU/Linux	GNU/Linux and Windows	Windows
Extra cost to develop	Free ($99/year to distribute on App Store)	Free ($25 once to offer it on the Android Market Android Market Android Market is an online software store developed by Google for Android OS devices. Its gateway is an application program called "Market", preinstalled on most Android devices, allows users to browse and download mobile apps published by third-party developers... )	Free	Free	Free ($99/year to offer it on the Windows Phone Marketplace Windows Phone Marketplace Windows Phone Marketplace is a service by Microsoft for its Windows Phone 7 platform that allows users to browse and download applications that have been developed by third-parties... )	Free SDK, Free Signing Keys, Free Publishing in App World	Free (1€ once to offer it in the Ovi Store Ovi (Nokia) Ovi by Nokia is the brand for Nokia's Internet services. The Ovi services can be used from a mobile device, computer or via the web. Nokia focuses on five key service areas: Games, Maps, Media, Messaging and Music. Nokia's aim with Ovi is to include third party developers, such as operators and...	Free	Free	?
Feature	iOS	Android	webOS	Windows Mobile	Windows Phone 7	BlackBerry OS	Symbian	Maemo	MeeGo	bada

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

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