"...For every Samsung device that was activated, Apple activated 2.9 devices," wrote Jarah Euston, VP of analytics and marketing at Flurry. "For every Microsoft Lumia device activated, Apple activated 8.8 devices."

This year also saw a big jump in "phablet" activations (devices larger than 5.5 inches, but smaller than seven inches) during the holiday period. While Samsung's Galaxy Note 4 assuredly had something to do with that, the equally large iPhone 6 Plus played an even bigger part: It was one of the top 5 devices activated during Christmas. Altogether, 13 percent of devices activated were phablets (compared to a measly 4 percent last year). Not surprisingly, the rise of phablets is also eating into large tablet activations, which fell from 17 percent in 2013 to 11 percent this year.