While Kantarâ€™s US numbers are interesting, the company looked a lot closer at the UK market, where they found some pretty good news.

First looking at the rest of the results, Windows Phone made gains in all of the markets tested, indicating that Windows Phone 8 may be the OS which takes Windows Phone mainstream.

In Germany Windows Phone now stands at 5.1% market share for the 3 months ending January 2013, up from only 2.6% last month, indicating the market there was indeed waiting for Windows Phone 8 handsets to arrive.

In France the OS is now up to 5.7%, up from 4.1% and finally outselling Bada and RIM.

Italy remain Windows Phoneâ€™s best market, with 14% market share, up from 13.9% last months.

In Australia it is now 3.4% and China 1.2%, up from 0.9% last month.

in UK Windows Phone now holds 6.2% market share, up from 5.9% last month and 2.4% last year.

This translates to about 1 million Windows Phone users in UK, with 700,000 added in the last year.

Kantar notes Windows Phone, while a minority OS, was now selling in significant quantities.

Dominic Sunnebo, global consumer insight director at Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, explains: â€œNokia is spearheading this growth, with the Lumia 800 the leader among the Windows handsets. However, it is not the only manufacturer benefitting from the increasing popularity of Windows. HTCâ€™s 8X is now the third bestselling Windows device in Great Britain, demonstrating the clear cross-manufacturer opportunity of the platform.

Android Symbian RIM iOS Feature phones 17% 26% 6% 2% 47%

Which OS are new Windows Phone users #Switching from?

He notes:

â€œWith Windows now holding respectable market shares across most major European countries, a key question is who is losing out? In Great Britain, 17% of new Windows customers switched from Android, 26% from Symbian, 6% from RIM and just 2% from iOS. 47% were first time smartphone buyers. â€œUnderstanding the source of growth for the Windows platform is crucial to devise and implement the right marketing and sales strategy. The fact that nearly one in five new customers switched from an Android device should give Microsoft, and its partners, confidence that its OS has what it takes to bring the fight to more established platforms. As almost 30% of its customers switch from rival OSâ€™s, the worry that Microsoft will have to rely on attracting the dwindling pool of first time smartphone buyers to drive future growth is reduced.â€

If Windows Phone is able to take market share from the vast pool of Android users then the idea of a permanent duopoly is pretty busted, and the sky is really the limit going forward.

See the full numbers after the break.

Via Kantar.

Thanks Arun and Janis for the tip.