The newer the OS version, the more stable, but Google’s Android seems to have a major edge in stability over its Apple-created competitor iOS.
According to a report from Crittercism, all the recent versions of Android since Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0) are notably more stable than iOS.
These results may seem counter-intuitive to some, who have been used to Apple computers being more stable than their Windows counterparts due to the company’s control over the entire ecosystem, and building the hardware itself. However, in playing catch up to Apple over the last few years, Google has focused heavily on the stability of its platform and it has started to show.
In order of stability, the OSes were ranked (from most to least stable):
- Android KitKat (4.4) – apps crash 0.7% of the time
- Android Jelly bean (4.3) – apps crash 0.7% of the time
- Android Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0) – apps crash 0.7% of the time
- Android Gingerbread (2.3) – apps crash 1.7% of the time
- iOS 7.1 – apps crash 2.1% of the time
- iOS 6 – apps crash 2.5% of the time
As these stats show, apps on the latest version of iOS, actually crash three times more often than any the Android versions since Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0).
Crittercism also broke down the stats to show which apps were the most “crashy”, and found that it was games that were by far the worst contenders – crashing up to 4.4% of the time.