iOS and Android accounted for 99.9% of the global smartphone market in 2017

A record 99.9% of smartphones sold globally last year were captured by iOS and Android, with the other platforms coming out on top, according to data shared today by Gartner.

Android remained as the most adopted operating system with 86% instead of 14% of iOS. The predominance of Android is not surprising considering that it "wears" on dozens of different models of smartphones, of a wide price range, while the iPhone is generally targeted at the high-end category.

Android and iOS have led mobile operating systems for many years to date, but the duel became so loud last year, forcing Gartner to aggregate the BlackBerry and Windows Phone shares. The percentages of both combined touched 0.1% for 2017.

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For perspective, Gartner estimates that of the 1.5 million smartphones sold last year, some ran BlackBerry OS, Windows Mobile while the rest belonged to the other platforms.

Although BlackBerry and Windows Phone had relatively good prospects, it seems that they didn't make it against Google and Apple. Especially now that the percentage has reached 99.1%, it seems that the run of these two operating systems is coming to an end.

Meanwhile, BlavkBerry recently announced that it will continue to support its BlackBerry 10 operating system for the next two years at least while encouraging customers to invest in TCL-made Android devices. BlackBerry World and various other services appear to be terminated by the end of 2019.

Back in October, Microsoft announced that it would continue to support Windows 10 Mobile with security updates and bug fixes, without developing new features. It also stressed that no other devices will be released that carry Windows 10 Mobile.

The decline of BlackBerry in particular is remarkable, given that it was a pioneer in the smartphone sector. Its devices continued to gain in popularity for almost two years after the release of the first iPhone in 2007, at the expense of the hitherto leader which was Nokia, capturing 20% of the global market in 2009.

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It only took a few years for the popularity of the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy to drive iOS and Android respectively to the top, leaving BlackBerry and Nokia far behind. All of the above led to today's Gartner results and the slow death of the other mobile operating systems.