It's official. The Galaxy S3, which debuted in May 2012, is the bestselling Samsung and Android smartphone to date as the South Korean tech giant announce on Thursday that over 20 million units have been scooped up by global consumers so far.

According to reports by The Korea Times, the S3's record sales were achieved after only 100 days of being in the market, effectively besting the impressive numbers that were previously registered by the handset's predecessors - the S and S2.

From the estimates provided by Samsung, the S3 moved out from store shelves around the world at rate of about 200,000 units during the first 50 days that the smartphone was shipped to Europe, North America, South Korea and the rest of the Asia-Pacific region.

"The Galaxy S3 has enjoyed tremendous attention and popularity since its launch in May, and we are thrilled with its success," Samsung Mobile Division Chief JK Shin was quoted by China Daily as saying in a statement.

The numbers reported by Samsung more than exceeded the projections earlier offered by Mr Shin, who a month after the S3 was unwrapped, has predicted that 10 million units of the phone will be sold in the immediate months ahead.

He has expressed confidence that that sexy and large-screen gadget, which is powered by the latest version of Google's Android, will lure new users willing to try out the other platform aside from Apple's iOS.

By the end of June quarter of 2012, Samsung has reported that it sold about 50 million smartphones and 20 per cent of the total numbers were S3s.

At around that time too, Samsung regained its crown as the world's biggest smartphone producer and seller, besting Apple for three of the last four quarters in the past 12 months.

Its luck, however, ran aground in August when a U.S. jury found that Samsung had violated a number of Apple's exclusively-owned technology, awarding the latter more than $US1 billion as damage.

The decision could also lead to the permanent sales prohibition of Samsung smartphones and tablets from the U.S. market, which could include the popular S3 and Galaxy Note, depending on a later determination by a U.S. federal court handling the patent case.

Nonetheless, Samsung has continued to attract more buys, as shown by its latest statement, and likely even converts from Apple's home turf in the North American region.

From the three months that have passed, four million U.S. buyers bought the S3, Samsung said, underscoring it steady climb despite the legal woes that the company has been encountering in the region.

But the best sales figures that Samsung can claim is in Europe, where the S3 was bought by some six million consumers spread throughout the region, with Asia coming in second at 4.4 million purchases of the gadget so far.

On its homeland, the S3 is now owned by some 2.5 million South Koreans, Samsung said.

It is likely that Samsung will retain the leadership of the global smartphone competition by the end of the September 2012 quarter, analysts said, and according to The Korea Times, Samsung is bent on doing that by proving more colour options to the S3.

From the present while and blue S3s presently available (with the red exclusive to U.S. consumers), three more choices will be dispatched very soon in all key markets, the publication said.

But Apple is not to far as the tech giant is all set to unfurl the veil from its new handset, the iPhone 5, which media reports said will be formally introduced via an Apple event scheduled on Sept 12.

Once out in the market, which could be two to three weeks after its formal launch, the new iPhone 5 is expected to briskly move out in millions in days, probably topping the 10 million mark in just a week and en route to huge sales numbers by the end of December 2012.

By that time, another king could be sitting at the smartphone throne, analysts said.