For the fifth year in a row, the Apple iPhone has ranked the very highest in smartphone customer satisfaction. J.D. Power and Associates announced this news today as they have been doing since the release of the first-generation iPhone. This time, the news obviously applies to the iPhone 4.

For a fifth consecutive time, Apple ranks highest among manufacturers of smartphones in customer satisfaction with a score of 795 and performs particularly well in ease of operation, operating system, features and physical design. Motorola (763) and HTC (762) follow Apple in the smartphone rankings.

 As J.D. Power and Associates states, Motorola is runner up with a score of 763 -- a full 32 points below Apple. HTC slides in right underneath in third place with a score of 762, just one point below Motorola.

In related news, Sanyo takes the cake for traditional mobile phone customer satisfaction this year with a score of 715.