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Three quarters of mobile Web browsing in the UK is performed on an Apple device, according to new figures. Mobile Web-advertising agency AdMob reckons that the iPhone and iPod touch do 74 per cent of the mobile browsing in the UK, and 60 per cent across the world.
What is AdMob?
AdMob, recently bought by Google, serves graphical banner and text link ads on more than 15,000 mobile Web sites and applications. Whenever you open a page with an AdMob ad, a request goes to AdMob. Its analysis of which devices made those requests in October have been released in a PDF report.
There are more than 10 billion monthly ad requests in the global market. Although these figures aren’t an accurate reflection of all mobile browsing across the whole Internet, the numbers involved give the report credence.
Global mobile browsing
Apple devices — specifically, the iPhone and iPod touch — make 60 per cent of the total number of worldwide requests, more than six times the amount of browsing by Sony Ericsson and Nokia devices. HTC devices make 6 per cent of requests and RIM‘s BlackBerry range clocks in at just 2.3 per cent.
UK mobile browsing
The iPhone performs 74 per cent of UK smart phone browsing. Nokia and HTC take 10 per cent each, tying up with Symbian and Android each taking a tenth of traffic by OS. BlackBerry rounds out the UK chart with 4 per cent of traffic.
The iPhone alone cleans up 44 per cent of traffic. The iPod touch is a distant second with 16 per cent. HTC and Android make a good showing here, with the T-Mobile G1, Magic and Hero taking third, fifth and sixth spots and a total of 5.9 per cent. The only other handsets to take more than 1 per cent are the venerable Nokia N95 and Sony Ericsson K800i. The Sony PSP takes 0.6 per cent, as do RIM’s BlackBerry 9000 and 8900.
UK mobile browsing by network
Unsurprisingly, the iPhone makes up 70 per cent of O2’s traffic. Apple also takes a small slice of traffic on 3, T-Mobile, Orange and Vodafone. They’re statistically insignificant numbers but we think it’s interesting, perhaps as evidence of jailbroken phones or even of rumoured under-the-counter sales by other networks.
Considered by network, 3 and Orange boast roughly equal amounts of traffic from Nokia and Sony Ericsson, with a dash of Samsung thrown in. T-Mobile and Vodafone’s share of traffic is dominated by HTC, while RIM’s strongest showing is on Vodafone.
The future
The handset results are affected by the fact Apple sells only one phone, where other companies sell a wide range. But the iPhone is a genuine mobile Web revolution, as the first and best phone to give you a real Internet experience. It’s only going to get more popular as it arrives on other networks, although it’s already facing competition. By next year we reckon Android will have pulled back some of that share of traffic.
