OpenSignal: About a quarter of Android smartphones are dual-SIMs now

With communication shifting towards IM and VoIP apps, one might think that dual-SIM phones are on their way out, but it turns out that’s not the case. According to OpenSignal about a quarter of Android smartphones tend to be dual-SIMs.

It’s a very regional thing – countries with strong carrier subsidies have very few multi-SIM devices, while countries with a “bring your own device” model tend to have a lot more.

In the Top 20 countries by multi-SIM penetration at least 40% of all devices have more than one SIM. At the Top is Nigeria where two thirds of phones have multiple SIMs. Senegal, which is in 20th position, still has a 42% share of multi-SIM Android phones.

The countries on this list account for a huge chunk of the world’s population, so the market for dual (and more) SIM devices is looking in great shape.

On the other end of the spectrum are countries where carrier common and a flagship device is usually sold at little added cost. Somewhat surprisingly, Norway is the country with the fewest multi-SIM Androids, not even 1% of the market.

Among multi-SIM Androids, the top 3 devices are Samsungs – Galaxy Core, Galaxy Win Duos (two versions) and Galaxy S Duos. After that comes Lenovo and most surprisingly Nokia. Yep, 0.86% of all multi-SIM Androids are a Nokia XL. The Nokia X also made the Top 10.

Note that OpenSignal made the estimate based on 1 million users of its Android app, so obviously these numbers don’t include multi-SIM feature phones. Also, since there’s no standardized Android API to check the number of SIMs, the numbers may be off. One thing is for sure though, the number of active phone connections does not accurately show the number of actual users.

Source | Via