Windows Phone Sees 'Continued Growth'

Windows Phone may have captured only 5.6 percent of the U.S. smartphone market, but it still "showed continued growth" during the first quarter, according to Monday stats from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech.

Microsoft's mobile operating system grew from 3.7 percent at end of March 2012 to 5.6 percent during the first three months of 2013, Kantar said.

"As iOS and Android continue to battle it out for top selling smartphone OS, we have seen Windows steadily grow over the past year and is now at its highest sales share figure so far," Kantar analyst Mary-Ann Parlato said in a statement.

Microsoft still lags behind top competitors Android and Apple's iOS, though both fluctuated in the past year.

Android captured 49.3 percent of U.S. smartphone sales in the first quarter, up from 47.9 percent during the same time period last year. But Android "saw only slight growth compared to the same period last year, and is down versus the 3 months ending February 2013 (-1.9 percent)," Kantar found.

At No. 2, Apple captured 43.7 percent of the market during the quarter, down from 44.6 last year.

Earlier this month, Kantar said Windows Phone had 4.1 percent of the U.S. market, thanks in part to the popularity of Nokia's Lumia 920.

Kantar said today that Microsoft has had luck with customers upgrading to smartphones from feature phones. Of those who upgraded to Windows Phone in the last year, 52 percent previously owned a feature phone. Meanwhile, the majority of new iOS and Android customers were repeat smartphone buyers — 55 percent were new Apple customers, while 51 percent joined Android from another OS.

"While the differences between these figures are small, with over half of the U.S. market still owning a feature phone, it's likely that many will upgrade over the coming year, which will ultimately contribute to more growth for the Windows brand," Parlato said.

For more, see PCMag's review of Windows Phone 8 and the slideshow above.

Meanwhile, Kantar reported little movement among the top smartphone carriers in the U.S. market. Verizon had 37.2 percent of smartphones sold in the three months ending in March, while AT&T once more came in at second with 27.9 percent. Sprint continued to chug along in third place, carrying 12.3 percent of the market.

T-Mobile was the only carrier to decline during the first three months of the year, Kantar said, falling from 12.7 percent to 9.5 percent of smartphones sold. Toward the end of the quarter, however, T-Mobile ditched contracts, launched its 4G LTE network, and landed the iPhone, which might help the carrier in the coming quarters.