Admit it: you rely on all manner of high-tech gadgets to get you through the day. How many hours could you go without checking your smartphone? Could you give up your laptop for a week? Perhaps, but only because your tablet does pretty much all of the same things. These figures reveal the extent of the global love affair with gadgets, and a few surprising recent trends.
Smartphones: Image vs. popularity
Everyone knows the statistic about more people globally owning mobiles than toothbrushes. But did you know that over one in five of these 5 billion phones is a smartphone?
You may not be surprised to learn that people between the ages of 25 and 34 are most likely to own a smartphone, but the market leader is not who you might expect it to be.
Apple has just 19.4% of the global smartphone market share by the end of 2012. With 68% of global mobile market, Android is blazing ahead in terms of sheer numbers. Yet it could be argued that the iPhone wins the image war, with one 2012 study even linking iPhone ownership to higher levels of education, cultural consumption and earning.
The Tablet: Saviour of traditional media?
In 2012, the tablet really took off. 11% of adults globally now own a tablet computer. And while the smartphone revolution came hand in hand with the rise of apps and mobile gaming — handheld entertainment, there are clear signs that the tablet market is more news- and information-focused.
About two-thirds of tablet users have a news app, and 53% of tablet users access news stories daily on their devices, compared to just 30% who use them for daily gaming. What’s more, the tablet could represent a lifeline for established media organisations, with 80-90% of users seeking news direct from a named source, rather than via an aggregator or search engine.
Switching on to switch off?
Although we might talk about ‘switching off’ and relaxing, in fact the evidence shows that when it comes to downtime, people aren’t putting down their gadgets. Instead, we simply change which ones we use and how we use them.
It’s currently estimated that 49% of all mobile users engage in mobile gaming, and by 2016 it’s expected that 53% of the world’s general population will be mobile gamers. Meanwhile, social gaming numbers continued to grow in 2012, rising by 10%.
E-Readers reached general usage before complex tablets, and continue to be popular. In 2011, 16% of Americans were reading e-books, and this rose to 23% in 2012. Internet retail giant Amazon leads the way; 62% of e-reader owners had a Kindle at the end of 2012.
These figures were gathered by marketing automation company Eloqua to mark TFM&A (the Technology for Marketing and Advertising show), and its open competition to win a Modern Marketing Survival Kit including An Amazon Kindle and £625 in Apple vouchers.
