What Are Smartphone Owners Using Their Devices for in 2022?
The millennial generation has a distinctly different relationship with their mobile devices than those who came before them. While the first widely available mobile devices were limited to call functionality alone, the smartphone of today is a different beast. Even a mid-range smartphone can be utilised for all manner of applications. Read on as we delve deeper into how smartphone usage has changed in the modern era.
Mobile Messaging
It’s estimated the average person checks their smartphone once every four minutes. If you’re guilty of this, chances are you’re not checking your home screen for missed call alerts. Although data and call costs are cheaper than ever, the overall volume of mobile calls has been dropping in recent years. Nowadays, the average smartphone owner is far more likely to connect via text. Globally, around 23 billion SMS messages are sent every day. When you factor in app-to-app messaging, the total volume of text-based communications is far higher. On WhatsApp alone, more than 100 billion messages are sent daily.
Mobile Commerce
The ecommerce industry continues to go from strength to strength. By the end of 2022, the global market is expected to be worth more than $5.4 trillion. Smartphone users are largely responsible for driving ecommerce growth. In 2021, more than 72% of all ecommerce sales were carried out on mobile devices. Meanwhile, more than 60% of consumers use their smartphones to make all online purchases. This is hardly surprising. M-commerce speeds up the buyer journey and makes online transactions far more accessible to everyday users. Furthermore, retailers can leverage smartphones and mobile-based browsing to provide consumers with tailored content and unique marketing strands.
Online Gambling
The online gambling market is booming. Ever since the advent of online casinos, web-based wagering has given bricks and mortar casinos a run for their money. By 2030, the online gambling market is expected to be worth $172 billion. Most of this growth will be steered by an increased volume of smartphone and mobile users. Mobile-only casinos are incredibly popular, particularly with younger players. Why? For starters, the touchscreen capabilities of even a low-end smartphone allow for immersive gaming experiences. Furthermore, most operators provide lucrative promotions for first-time customers. You only need to look at this list of the best bonuses by SPCasinos to get an idea of the kind of incentives on offer.
Social Media and Smartphones
Social media and smartphones are now synonymous with each other. However, this hasn’t always been the case. Back in the early 2000s when Myspace dominated the social media sector and Facebook was in its infancy, many users relied largely on desktops to access social channels. Today, around 4.5 billion people use social media regularly. Of these, 99% access social media apps or sites exclusively via a smartphone or tablet.
Content Creation
One of the biggest technological advances of smartphones was the inclusion of an integrated camera. The Samsung SCH-V200 was the first camera phone to hit the market. Although revolutionary at the time, the SCH-V200 could only store 20 photos at relatively poor resolution. It would be another decade before megapixel camera phones were released, making higher resolution images and video accessible to all.
Around 4.7 billion photos are captured daily. Of these, more than 85% of them are snapped on a smartphone. In the next few years, expect smartphones and tablets to inch out conventional cameras even more. It’d be easy to write off camera phone content as second-rate. However, many professionals have embraced smartphones. Devices like the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra and Google Pixel 6 Pro are both powerful pieces of kit that put many DSLR cameras to shame.
Smartphones have revolutionised the way we communicate and overhauled our consumer habits in just a handful of years. What’s next for smartphones? Expect artificial intelligence to drive the biggest innovations in smartphone technology. Over the next decade, don’t be surprised to find your voice assistants becoming smarter and augmented reality becoming an integral part of your daily life.