FORTUNE — When Samsung introduced the Galaxy S4 with Broadway-style fanfare in March, the assumption on Wall Street was that it was going to steal a march on Apple (AAPL), whose newest iPhone was already 6 months old and not getting any younger.
When Samsung sold fewer Galaxy S4s than expected, the assumption on the Street was that the market for high-end smartphones had become saturated, and that Apple’s iPhone sales would suffer the same fate — or worse — as the Galaxy S4’s.
So it was something of a surprise when Verizon (VZ) announced Thursday as part of its Q2 earnings report that 3.9 million (51%) of the 7.5 million smartphones it activated last quarter were iPhones.
“3.9 million topped our estimate of 3.5 million,” BTIG’s Walter Piecyk wrote in a note to clients, “and growth in those activations accelerated to >40% in Q2 from 25% in Q1.”
Verizon didn’t specify how many of the other 3.6 million activations were Android phones, or what percentage of those Androids were Samsung’s.