Platform distribution numbers for April: Marshmallow doubles usage to 4.6 percent

We probably don’t have to tell you that the rollout for Marshmallow has been glacially slow. The pace at which it’s been arriving on new devices has led to increased discussion about the so-called fragmentation of the Android ecosystem and whether or not this is a serious problem. However, the month of March 2016 marks the largest leap in Marshmallow adoption that the version has seen to date, perhaps due to the launch of several popular out-of-the-box Marshmallow devices like the Samsung Galaxy S7.

At the beginning of March, Android 6.0 was sitting at a sobering 2.3 percent share of the Android ecosystem. As of today, more than 4.6 percent of Android devices are running Marshmallow. That may seem like a thin sliver from a larger perspective, but given how slowly the version has been growing, this is a titanic leap.

We’ve now reached the point where more than half of Android users are running versions of the OS KitKat or higher, and all versions except for Lollipop and Marshmallow saw a drop in usership, which is good. With Android N already on the horizon, however, the ecosystem looks like it’s going to get shaken up even more.

There are those who believe that Android N will be taking measures to make software updates easier for carriers and manufacturers. If this is the case, it might serve as a long-term solution for this whole fragmentation issue. We’ll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, let us know what you think about the fragmentation discussion and whether or not you think it’s a serious concern. Are you running Marshmallow, or are you stranded in an earlier version of Android? Let us know in the comments!