Android and Apple Gobble Up More Mobile Marketshare

According to the latest numbers released by comScore, both Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS mobile operating systems gained marketshare in Q2 at the expense of rivals RIM, Microsoft, and Symbian.

In the report, comScore claims 78.5 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the three months ending in June 2011, up 8% from the preceding three month period.

Android ranked as the top smartphone platform with 40.1% of the market, up 5.4%. Apple improved its marketshare but remained in the No. 2 spot with 26.6% of the smartphone market, up 1.1 % from the prior reporting period. RIM ranked third and remained close behind Apple with 23.4%, but it lost 3.7% of its share according to the report. Microsoft at 5.8% (down 1.7%)and Symbian at 2.0% (down .3%) brought up the rear.

In addition to the more talked about enhancements made to iOS and Android over the last quarter, the steady influx of apps for both platforms surely helped win some consumers over. Couple that with recent a recent price drop on the iPhone 3gs at AT&T and a seemingly never-ending invasion of quality Android-based smartphones from a variety of manufacturers like Samsung and HTC, and it’s no wonder Google and Apple are outpacing their rivals.

Over the next few months, Microsoft is poised to release its next major update to Windows Phone, codenamed Mango, and along with it will come a number of new devices. RIM will release a handful of new handsets as well based on its updated Blackberry OS 7. And Apple will unveil its latest iPhone.

Although the last three months showed much activity in the mobile space, the next quarter is likely to stir things up even more.