Interactive Map Visualizes the Smartphone Wars

As consumers, we are constantly bombarded with data about the most popular smartphone platforms. Who's on top this week: Apple or Google? When will Blackberry rejoin the party?

But now, thanks to the creative thinking of an engineer and a data artist, those numbers and percentages can be turned into a visual experience.

By collecting every geotagged tweet since September 2011 — a grand total of 3 billion — custom mapmaker MapBox created stunning designs that showcase various facets of Twitter's ecosystem in a more interesting way than a pie chart.

"Together [MapBox engineer]Tom [MacWright] and data artist Eric Fischer used our open source tools to visualize the data and build interfaces that let you explore the stories of space, language, and access to technology," MapBox CEO Eric Gundersen wrote in a blog post.

Among those results is the Mobile Devices map — a global look at which phone platforms are most popular, and where. Designated by colors — green for Android, red for iPhone, purple for Blackberry — each can be independently toggled.

Interactive Map Visualizes the Smartphone Wars

Want to know the iPhone population of Topeka, Kansas? Or perhaps find out which country is swimming in Blackberrys? (The answer is Jakarta, Indonesia, actually.) Curious about how Androids stack up to their Apple competitors in Denver? The map will tell you, and look pretty doing it.

According to Gundersen, the patterns of usage in each city reflect class separation; iPhones tend to be predominantly in wealthy sections of a city, while Android phones have more coverage in poorer sections.

"On a global level," he said, "national trends reflect a complicated set of cultural preferences."

The science isn't exact: Only tweets from an official Twitter application are counted; those from Web browsers and other clients don't appear on the map. Still, this provides a fairly good look at the most tech-savvy areas of the globe, if not a glimpse into just how close the Apple-versus-Google tussle can get.

MapBox also analyzed the population of local residents versus tourists around the world, as well as the Languages on Twitter — a high-definition look at the various languages spoken in 140 characters or less.

Thumb around the map for yourself, and check out the slideshow above for a look at how the competition stacks up in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, London, and other tech-heavy locales.