According to Kantar Worldpanel the iPhone 6 launch brought improvement to Apple's smartphone market in both Europe and the US during the 3 months ending November 2014, at the expense of the Android competition. 

"While remaining the dominant global OS, Android’s market share dropped in most European markets and in the US where the decline was the first since September 2013," the analyst says. As a result Samsung "particularly" feels the squeeze during the period, while Motorola actually sees growth thanks to the value for money appeal of the Moto X and Moto G refreshes. 

Android remains the top mobile OS within the 5 biggest European markets (namely the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain) with 69.9% share, even if it is down by -3.2% Y-o-Y. The UK sees the biggest Android share decline at -6.7%, triggered by the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus launch leading to iPhones making 42.5% of British sales with 12.2% Y-o-Y growth. 

“The longer the new iPhone models are on the market the more their appeal will extend beyond Apple’s loyal customers," Kantar Worldpanel says. "For now customer switching from Android to iOS remains stable at 18%.” 

Meanwhile smartphone penetration across the top 5 European economies totals 65%, and while feature phone diehards (35% do not play to upgrade to a smartphone in the next 6 months) say they will not buy a smartphone in the near future, soon enough smartphones will be the only option available as more vendors transition to smartphone-only product portfolios. 

Go Apple Market Share Grows Across Europe (Kantar Worldpanel)