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Based on age alone, it would not be news that younger consumers are much more likely to own a smartphone than older consumers. But when you throw income into the equation, it becomes a completely different story.
To start off, overall smartphone penetration stood around 48 percent domestically by the end of January, according to a new report from Nielsen Wire.
The age group with the highest levels of smartphone ownership was the 24- to 34-year-old demographic with 66 percent of respondents acknowledging that they own a smartphone. In fact, 8 out of 10 people in this group got them in the last three months.
However, when income was taken into account, consumers between the ages of 55 and 64 with salaries of more than $100,000 per year made up the difference and were almost as likely as those in the 35- to 44-year age group making only $35,000 to $75,000 annually.
Smartphones aren’t really cheap commodities. On average, they cost $199 with the requirement of a two-year service agreement, data plans, and more. That can add up to several hundreds of dollars extra within a few months.
If you don’t want to deal with all of that, then you have to fork over around $599 or $699 for an unsubsidized device–and then you still have to pay for some kind of service plan (pay-as-you-go, etc.) afterwards.
Thus, a smartphone is an investment at any age, any income.
But the takeaway point here (especially important to anyone trying to sell these devices, ranging from marketing departments to the developers) would be that younger generations care more about the technology and are more likely to pay a high price regardless of the income, while older generations will probably only pay for these advanced devices if they have the extra income to do so.
For reference, the Nielsen report is based upon the responses of more than 20,000 mobile consumers in the United States who were surveyed in January.
This story originally appeared at ZDNet’s Between the Lines under the headline “Nielsen: Smartphone ownership rates clash over age, income“.
