Opera: iOS still king of mobile ads, iPhone alone has equal reach and more value than Android

It’s been a year since browser-maker Opera extended its series of insightful Internet studies with the introduction of its first State of Mobile Advertising report, and the company today provided its data and conclusions for Q2 2013.

The crux of the report is that iOS remains the most dominant mobile platform across Opera’s considerable global advertising network; that’s in terms of traffic, volume of impressions and value for money for advertisers. Apple’s dominance is particularly marked on tablets, where it accounts for 90 percent of traffic, while the reach of the iPhone alone is equal to that of all Android smartphones combined.

Within Android itself, Samsung is unsurprisingly dominant. RIM and its combination of new and old platforms leads Windows Phone and the rest of the mobile ecosystem, but they remain some way behind.

Before we look at the data, it’s worth pointing out that Opera has seen its advertising footprint grow massively over the past twelve months. Its reach has surged from 9,000 sites and apps serving 35 billion mobile ad impressions per month, to over 16 billion impressions from 13,000 sites/apps — that, in a nutshell, explains why its data is worthy of note.

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Back in Q1 2013, Apple’s iPhone regained its position ahead of Android smartphones, and it maintains that with a lead of just 0.3 percent — but, as mentioned, the Apple device is more lucrative than all Android combined.

Comparing iOS and Android directly: the Apple platform accounts for 44 percent of traffic and 49 percent of all ad revenues on the Opera network, Android is at 31 percent of traffic and 28 percent of cumulative network revenue.

Opera collectively bundles a number of lesser platforms together under ‘other’, but in this report it has broken out data for Windows Phone for the first time. While 0.26 percent of traffic and 0.30 percent of revenue may be minuscule, we expect the Microsoft platform to grow into third place replacing the declining BlackBerry and now-retired Symbian platforms at some point.

Looking specifically at phone-makers, Apple leads the pack on impressions (43 percent) with Samsung unsurprisingly positioned in second place, some way behind on 17 percent. Nokia’s platforms combined reach 10 percent. RIM, HTC and Google-owned Motorola are all sub-four percent.

As you would expect, Samsung dominates the Android category — with its phones accounting for 90 percent of impressions — while Apple takes more than 90 percent of the tablet category.

Opera says its mobile advertising network is on course to pull in over $600 million in revenue for its advertising partners, which is a significant raise on the $400 million it carded for 2012.

A reshuffle brought its ad units under one umbrella in February when Opera Mediaworks was launched. The company claims to be the largest dedicated mobile ad network on the planet.

Headline image via Opera