iPhone users addicted to mobile web

gallery

Do you have an Apple iPhone? If the answer is yes, there's a good chance that you’re addicted to the mobile internet – even more so than other smartphone users.

This is according to new statistics from comScore, which showed that 93 per cent of UK iPhone owners used the shiny device to access the web during the month of January.

Three quarters were using their iPhone to check email on the go, while 65 per cent used it to listen to mobile music and 55 per cent to check social networking sites.

Apparently the ability to check the web – be it for email, sports results, or facts in the pub – has the most appeal to men. According to comScore, three-quarters of iPhone owners are men between the ages of 18 and 44.

Alistair Hill, an analyst at comScore, said the iPhone is leading the smartphone pack when it comes to mobile web use. “The penetration of email usage on the iPhone is more than double that of the smartphone category as a whole,” he claimed.

Some 80 per cent of iPhone fans used their beloved device to check news over the net – four times the rate of other handsets.

Hill noted that phones without a full QWERTY keyboard were less likely to be used for web surfing. “Over the past several quarters, the UK smartphone market has been dominated by the N95, which lacks a qwerty keyboard,” he explained.

“As a result, we see smartphone users favour using their device for music and photo messaging, two activities for which these Nokia devices are particularly well-suited, more than e-mail.”

The comScore data also suggested the App Store is popular, with 55 per cent using an application downloaded from the Apple store to check news, while 37 per cent downloaded a game – nearly 19 per cent actually paid for one, compared to 5.6 per cent across other smartphones.

However, Hill also noted that the iPhone is still in relatively early stages. Therefore most users are early adopters and likely to be rather tech savvy.

“The iPhone is indeed an early adopter phenomenon in the United Kingdom,” said Hill, adding “it is also important to note that while nearly all iPhone owners are consuming mobile media, the device is in the hands of only two per cent of mobile phone users in the UK.”

Click here to read our review of the Apple iPhone 3G and here to read more about the future of the mobile web.

Email to a friend

Print this page