New Delhi, (IANS) : India overtook the US to become the largest country in terms of interest in mobile developer courses in 2016, Google India said on Tuesday — search queries in mobile development courses from India saw 200 per cent (year-on-year growth) in the last two years.

Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra led with bulk of Search queries for mobile developer courses.

“We have seen tremendous response across mobile developer courses from India, with 16,500 students enrolling every month, taking up Android development, mobile web development and learning new cloud-based technology courses,” said Peter Lubbers, Head, Google Developer Training, in a statement.

With India overtaking the US in usage and adoption of smartphones at 220 million active devices, the interest in learning development courses for mobile platform saw huge uptake in demand in the country.

Search interest in courses for mobile development also saw fast growth from Uttar Pradesh, with Search queries rising at 70 per cent year-on-year and Bihar seeing query growth of 158 per cent year-on-year.

“While India leads the world in terms of education-related queries, demand for vocational training courses has been steadily rising, comprising 40 per cent of the total search volume growing at a healthy rate of 50 per cent year-on-year,” Google India said.

The search interest in mobile development courses formed only six per cent of overall IT-related courses demand. The category is expected to grow rapidly as the industry demand for quality mobile developers continues to rise.

Training partners like Simplilearn, Udacity, Edureka, Koenig, Manipal Global, and UpGrad are the key private players which offer mobile development courses in India.

“Over 65 per cent of our mobile developer learners in India comprise of college students and fresh graduates, compared to the US where 60 per cent of the learners are working professionals between the age group 25-44,” added Krishna Kumar, CEO of Simplilearn.

Starting 2017, over 40 private and state technical universities will offer the “Android Fundamental” course as part of standard curriculum.