The smartphone market continues to explode, and the Android ecosystem has been the biggest beneficiary of that growth. According to the latest smartphone OS marketshare numbers from IDC, shipments of Android phones increased a whopping 73.5 percent to reach over 187 million units in the second quarter of 2013 — a figure that gives Android 79.3 percent of the smartphone marketplace. It's a dominance no doubt helped by Samsung, despite the fact that the company's marketshare amongst other manufacturers slipped a little bit this past quarter. The sheer volume of phones the company ships (over 72 million last quarter) has certainly benefitted the Android ecosystem.

While Apple increased the number of iOS phones it shipped year-over-year to 31.2 in the past quarter, its OS marketshare actually dropped a bit due to the Android dominance and growth from Windows Phone, which now holds 3.7 percent of the market thanks to the 8.7 million devices shipped in Q2. From a pure volume perspective, that represents an increase of 77.6 percent over Windows Phone shipments a year ago. As for Apple, we're in the lull between iPhone releases, so we wouldn't be surprised to see iOS get a bit of a bump thanks to a forthcoming new iPhone launch.

Indeed, in the battle for third place, it is becoming increasingly likely that Microsoft will continue to stake out its ground over its closest competitor, BlackBerry. BlackBerry shipments dropped 11.7 percent over Q2 2012 levels, and its marketshare shrank to only 2.9 percent. That's despite the fully-launched and readily available BlackBerry 10 OS and corresponding devices — if BlackBerry was hoping to see some pent-up customer demand drive its OS forward, that hasn't happened yet. While Windows Phone doesn't have a huge lead over BlackBerry, both operating systems are clearly going in different directions.