Google boasts 500,000 Android activations per day!

Consumers are activating more than half a million Android devices every day, and week-to-week growth in gadgets running the Google Inc software is at 4.4%, according to Android chief Andy Rubin.

Rubin did not disclose, in his Tuesday announcement on Twitter, how many of the devices being activated are smartphones and how many are tablet computers, a relatively new competitive battleground in wireless communications.

On December 8, Rubin had tweeted that daily Android phone activations had surpassed 300,000.

Android smart phones have surpassed Apple Inc's iPhone in popularity as the Google software powers the main handsets of manufacturers such as Samsung Electronics, HTC Corp and Motorola Mobility.

These companies have also developed tablet computers based on the Android software to compete with Apple's market-leading iPad.