iPhone tops satisfaction, Motorola close behind

Apple in a new ChangeWave study still topped customer happiness rankings but was met by relatively close competition from Motorola. The iPhone still led with 77 percent very satisfied, but the Droid helped Motorola grab a surprise 64 percent. Every other company scored significantly lower with users, as fellow Android maker HTC managed just 51 percent while RIM scored 46 percent.

How customers reacted to their phones depended largely on how advanced the phone was: roughly 80 percent of iPhone 3GS owners enjoyed their phones versus just 69 percent for iPhone 3G owners. Droid owners were much happier at 69 percent versus 50 percent for all other models. With HTC, only the Hero elicited a Droid-level reaction where the directly related Droid Eris only managed 50 percent.

BlackBerry owners were closely bunched together but had fundamentally mediocre impressions from their owners, as the Tour scored just 56 percent and the Storm mustered 45 percent.

Most of the reasons for users' tastes centered around features that played favorably into Apple's hands. The top demands were apps, ease of use and Internet access. Battery life was the sorest point across all phones, but AT&T's network quality made it the single most hated aspect of iPhone use. Ironically, the hardware QWERTY keyboard was the most disliked aspect of BlackBerries.

Researchers added that 32 percent of smartphone owners would have bought an iPhone if it had been available on their network, but both Android and iPhone OS were nearly even for satisfaction independent of the hardware or network.

By Electronista Staff